Journals Of Ralph Waldo Emerson With Annotations Vol.2

r

Salpb ^alHo Snuraom f

COMPUT E WORKS. Centenary ^Edition, la vols.,
f'own 8V* With Portraits, and copftus notes by JCd-
WARD W\ LDo Emerson. Price per volume, $1.75.

Natur^ Addret>ses, and Lectures, a. Essays:

Series. 3. Essays: Second Series. 4. Representative Men.
5. Englia*! Trails. 6. Conduct of Life. -Ty and

Solitude. 8. Letters and Social Aims. 9. Po^s. io.
Lectures andr: Biographical Sketches. *11. Miscellanies.
12. I'atural IBstory of int^ect, and other Papers. With
a General Ind« to Emerson’s Collected Works.

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Little Classic Edition, t a vols., in arrangement and con-
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HOUGHVON MIFFtiN .eOI^PANY
Boston ani^New York

- . ‘ N

^ — _

JOURNALS

OF

RALPH WALDO EMERSON
1820—1872

VOL. II

journals

OF

RAL*PH WALDO EMERSQN

WITH ANNOTATIONS

EDITED BY

EDWARD WALDO EMERSON

AND

WAy)0 EMERSON FORBES
1824—1832

LoiAjc^n

C0NI5TABT[^E & CO. Limited

BOSTON* AND YORK

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
1900

COPYRIGHT, 1909, BY EDWARD WALDO LMERSON
ALL RIGHTb RESERVED

CONTENTS

rEAC^ER AND DlVINirY STUDENY

.JOURNAL XV

1824

Letter to Aunt JVlary: Byron’s death. Books of the Cen-
turies, A Man. Each and All. Tiberius, Questionings:
Truth elusive? honest doubts; good seen everywhere.

Books and Men. Writing for Americans, a proposed
Spi^tator, Civilization. Society or Solitude. Frag-
ment for^ Sermon, God within. Imagination. Provi-
dence. JPaith a telescope. Aunt Mary’s reproving letter:

Holy Ghost”; degenerate Cambridge; Channing
^and Ware; diluted Calvinism; Christ against “Ger-
man madness ” ; an appeal. A portion of the nephew’s
answer; The God of Nature against the God •f Cal-
vig. Verses, Forefathers* Da^, Books, 1 • • • 3

JOURNAL XVI

1825

Reflections on loosing his School; cultivate sympathy.
Verses on^eavingf»the x)ld ^ife for the new. Prosperity
and Arms.. Piditorial confidc*nccs*: A^icesity; firothers;
Conventional life ; selfishness. P^verett’s PlymoiuH
Oration; Medixval (iespair and modern hope; Fortune
or Providence^ Strength of weajkncss. Practical poetry,

“ Keeping,” Solitude; dissuasions fr^m the ministry;

vi .CONTENTS

•

a free mind. Henley Clay, Leaves Roxbury for Cam-
bridge Divinity School; reflections. Poetical quotations.

Ministry of the Day; the sag^s o6 old. Solifude
or Society again; Action. Poem, Inches ( The Cater-
Letter to Aunt Mary: Anthropomorphism;
the Divinity* of common sense always^ej^gnized;
Nature’s influenre. Modern progress. The Educated
Mind. Books. ^11 health; leaves Cambridge.

JOURNAL XVII
18:26

Teaching again in Roxbury and Cambridge. Joy in
writing again. Faces the uncertain future. Contend
with Nineteenth Century. Compensation; people who
sell themselves; Sin is ignorance. Another letter to Aunt
Mary: Hume, his influence; each must have his own
religion; Value of Christianity, even though transient.
Greatness. The Sabbath. Slave trade. Verses, Fate.
Rulers# Bitness. The Wind a poet. Another letter to
Aunt Mary: German criticism of Christian evidences^
loss of the tradition would be tragic; ,not to fee pas-
si^ly abandoned. Reason in religion. Reflections and
hop^. Byron. Age of Chivalry; Charles’s reijj^rk.
The world our teacher; History, its help for ideals.
Another letter: ^dtjpation afte^; death. PubTic ^prayer.
Growth of one’s knowledg^^ ForethoCight and after-
thought. Frienflshipf Style. Hints of history*. Seed-
thought. Verses, Living-pruye^^ Immortality. Letter to
Aunt Mary: Value of eyes; Everett^ s Phi ^eta Kappa
ocation; genius, the Spirit pf the Age ? Shakspeare; The
Mundji^c Soul; Man clings to identity; the Hereafter

CONTENTS vii

unwofthily pictured; hard to conceive without Matter;

► surely welcome. Another letter: Poetry; Poet needs
malerial fd^m. Life as^wellas Imagination; Shakspeare
I and Wordsworth contrasted; criticism of latter; whaf
k poetry ? Happiness defined. Letter to Aunt Mary:*
the moments ol^ ouf lives. Funeral rites of Adam# and
Jefferson.^ Letter to E^dward: the SouPs affinities.
Quiddlc. Reflections, bowing to necessity. Campsoft
Reed’s Uook. Increasing ill health and depression;
hope of EdwardVreturn from Europe; take courage,
and die like a gentleman. Christianity and morals; Rea-
son of Evil. Religmus dogmas pass; what then? Pot-
sons. Letter to Aunt Mary: Hume again, and Gibbon.
Shakspetre; Burke; Everett; Emerson’s own cold
t<irnperamcnt.* Another letter: Sampson Reed’s Growth
of the Mind^ Swedenborgians; day of sentiment. Ap-
probated to preach. Combats of Conscience. Belief
in^fcc Resurrection. Study of History,* Butler on trans-
lations. Verses: Life or Death; Song. Emerson sails
southward for his health. Versatility. The voyage.*
Charlegon; tides of thought. Moral sense native; dis-
coveries and ^icnce im morals. Advancing religion,
ifypocrisy; sin carries its reward. Thcologic war.
Maniiprs; Southern courtesy. Reading . . . .

rOlING •MINISTER

JOURNAL XVIII

.1827

The new year; reflections, principle. JNote-books. Love
of eloquence. The fortunate generation, freemasonry

viii contenVs

of the dull. The Flag. Iron. Verses, Sf, August ine ^

4 and notes on that city. Determination of Right.
*Princc Napoleon. Achille Murat. Dark hours; .*ights of
conscience; doubts; sovereignty^ 9 f ethics. Tallahassee,
vi^t to the Murats. Letters to Charles and William,
^inorc^ns and Indians. Gibbet-irons. Peculiarities
of the Present Age. Ingratitude. Necessity. Virtue and
gentus. Tkt coming duties. The way of the great.
Living in the future. St. Augustine’s priest; Indians
again. Letters to Edward and Charles^ on Moments,
and .the value of letters. Letter to Aunt Mary: Mean-
ness and grandeur; patriotism; prayei. Church at St.
Augustine. The Bible educates. The slave-auction and
the Bible meeting, Methodist preaching. Pantheism
and Atheism. Verses in exile. Letter to Aunt Mary:
improving health; the House of Pain, its benefit. Re-
signation not easy. Verses, Farewell to St, Augustine,
Letter to William, friendship with Achille Murat.
Charleston; good gifts of travel. Account of Murat and
his l^ter to Emerson. Miss Emerson’s letter to Mrs.
Ripley: evolution and religion; unbelief; biblical criti-
cism. Joy in thought; philosophic scriptures. Charles-
ton. Verses on spontaneous utterance. *** Listen.” ^
Autobiographic verses. ^Alexandria; returning course.
Compensation^ Letter to Edward: Dr. Channing and
inferior clergy. Letter to Aunt Mary : ^Alexandria;
Bride of Lammermoori^ aspirations for art, letters and
science an‘argu«icnt for Immortality. President John
Quincy Adams. The Lions of Philadelphia and New
York. Emerson’s preachings ^n home. Some

gain in health. Vers^ At the Old Manse ; The Stormy

CONTENTS

IX

and iddc<^ verse to the poem Fame. Letter to Aunt
Mary: Dissolving of creeds after death; Immortality;

FftfiT of Death. Coystahcy. The Magnet. A good
, hope. Another letter: Let the Preacher give from hfe
^wn store. Use the minutes. Evidences. Solitude. Pre#
sident Adams^ Gf nius and Domesticity. Alpine flow-
ers. Th^ Universal Mjnd. Sonnet in Sickness. Ellen
Tucker. Places and days. Song. Letter •to AuRt
Mary: Religious feeling keeps alive through the ages
among the enthuliastic and the grave; Reason in reli-
gion; and Imagination; God within. Reading. . * . 144

JOURNAL XIX

i8a8

Preaching ancT practice. Use of time. Public Opinion.

All knowledge valuable. Visit to the Prison. Selec-
tions from Wordsworth. Notes on Poetry: Criticism
of Wordsworth; Shakspeare; Ben Jonson; Mont-^
gomcry and Wordsworth. Milton. Burnap on Dr.
Watts^andD^ Doddridge. Deity. Mr. Otisanfjudgc
Sf>«icer. Offiee of Religion: Action as well as contem-
plation, yet action is not all; God the Pilot. Inspira-
tion, •FricnSs. Silence. << Writing do wnf*' Saunter*
ings — autobiogrjiphical. Education; good •signs iif
children. Ed\fard Bliss ^Imerson's Sketch for a Ser-
mon. Conscience connects God to MRn. ^torai kribw-
ledgc. Duelling. Self-reliancot Power of Mind. Sit-
uation. Man is his o^n Star. Reading, justice.
Beauty’s immunity. The splendour of English Poetry.
Forgiveness. Engagemcift to Ellen^uckjr. . . 227

X

contenVs

MINISTER OF THE SECOND CHURCH
OF BOSTON

r

JOURNAL’ XX

1829

• «

Lines to Ellen. Letter to Aunt Mary: the gobd day» come

to tke family; trust agfainst misgiving. The Call to the
Second Church of Boston; reflections. The Fashionist
in novels. Verses on the independent Ij^e. More line^
to Ellen. Marriage. The New Jerusalem Church.
Boohs. The Social Principle. Reading Nature; idolatries
or God. Prayer. Serenity. Human Metamorphosis.

Every man free. Second letter to Aunt Mary: Human
progress; the cheering miracle of life; the idea of God.
Perseverance, Habit, Force. Third letter to Aunt
Mary: the ailing knee; Coleridge; a conventional
or living Christmas .Sermon ? Coleridge again. Uses of
biography. Reading *257

JOURNAL XXI

1830

Aunt Mary on intellectual debt to others. Story from Plu-
tarch. Spirit of the Age. Your thought Gertl’s gift.

Solon and ^ycurgus. Metaphysics; civics. Aristotle;
epitomized thoifght. Saying of Fenelon. Human desires.
Natural gogdness. Ministers’ Conduct, self-denial, do
not worry about cxamplj. Chemistry, Providence,
Marriage of facts. Ideas of God. Religion sublimed.
Miracles. Creeds grow from the structure of the crea-
ture; petty providentes. Donne’s counsel as to our

CONTENTS

responsit)iIities. Original poems. Preaching. Prayer.
Waster’s reply to Hayne. The Deacon. One having
Avithority.” The Year. Solitude; Wisdom and Virtue
bound together; jJharacter. Humility and Pride. Self-
reliance; we shape ourselves and have compensations.
Wh?> ii religious ? Asking reasons. Attitude of Won *
d»w. Buckminster; all subjects good ; pertinence, i^p-
piness or Serenity ? Happiness unearned. Tftwn and
Field. Men weighed against Nature. Dugald Stew-
art. Judg^ Howe. Resolves. Self-reliance. Simple
Truth, Enterprising virtue. Poem, The Nightingale,
Census of Slaves. Temperamental virtue; Fr^e trade;
Merit of talking shop.” Fear of Death; Ancestral
Christian death beds. Thought, not experiment, finds
God. Enthusiasts; Swedenborgians, Quakers, Metho-
dists.^ Be yourself. Perseverance; temperance, wise
severance of the flesh from the Spirit. Patriotism. The
Law, why reverenced. Means*and Ends. Brave econ-
omy. Plotinus. As to history of Jesus, trust your Soul;
God in the Soul. Ourselves in others. The ko'Hr self.
The truth is everyone’s concern. The
important ; Mir^icles. Christianity W'cighed by truths
Bacon. Newton. Holy Days. The great facts. Stir
.Thomas Browne. Reading. DeGeran^o on Ancient Phi-
losophies. s Prima Phi/osophia. Ancient Cosmo-

gonies. Thc?gonics.^ Ideapsm, Peter Jiunt. The Ionian
School; Vhalcs,* Anaximander^ Anaxagoras,^Diogenes
of Apollonia, Archelaus. The Itallhn School ; Pytha-
goras, Archytas, Eudoxus. The Eleatic School; Xeno-
phanes, Parmenides, Zeno, Heraclitus, Hippocrates.
Hymn, There is in all tbe^sons of men. Extracts

i CONTENTS

froTm Samuel Daniel, Donne, and Herbert, St. Pai\J,

NovaKs, Goethe, Lessing, Landor, and Lee’s Life of

Cuvief^ ' . . *

• ^ ^

JOURNAL XXII
1831

Neighbour’s ^laim is^through CJod. Greatness, Nobility.
Ethics bind Christian and Theist. Essential doctrines.
Death of Ellen Tucker Emerson. Plotinus on Ood; Ne-
cessary Truths. God in all. The True Holy Ghost.
Wisdom afid Goodness one; hence Religionism ust not
fear Science. Genius is Reception ; Examples, Jesus,
Socrates, Milton, and others. Live as if forever, but
man of God must be human. Verses on Country Life.
Sad meditation. Conscience. Calm. Fast-Day Sermon,
honour to the Forefathers. The Bride of Lam mer moor ;
heroic characters. Novels ;‘iove of the Ideal Doctrine of
Trust; gratitude. Heaven guards man’s freedom. Man’s
inertia. Plotinus. Quotation from Schiller’s Wallen-
stein, Colerid^’s Translation. Admiration a fine
trait. Be true to yourself. The Sunday .School rfieet-
ing;%true attitude of a teacher. The blind and the
illumiifeted mind; worth in the worthless. Lines
Death. Verses to Ellen. Visit to Vermont. Be God’s
child, not a sectarijvp. The Unteac;Jiable ^i^om.
Thomas a Kempis, Fenel;on,c|ind Scougal. Freedom
of the Wise. Verses, ^he days pass over me. Extracts
from Giordano Bruno, Stewart, Wordsworth. Com-
pensation. Nourish high sentiments. High aipis assure
of immortality. God maker us answ<pr our prayers.

281

CONTENTS

xiir

Obedience conquers. Shame of ^ignorance. Verses,
on Death; VvCiBi Scavrdv. President Monroe. Morals
and Intellect, l^oint of View. Law. The ^Id^ssed
Nineteenth Cefitury. The righr word; tes! of good
wilting; poems; Shakspeare; Wordsworth ;• t^e old
Engli?flj writers. He invents who pr(fvcs ; the dis-
cerning eye. The Solitude of the Stul among friends.
God in us. Education, Love and^ Death* Phi Beta
Kappa. Longing for friendship. Thoughts that set one
aglow ; friends capable of such ; Ellen. Thin dis-
guises. R^ht use of riches. The real power ; Napo-
leon, Cromwell, Andrew Jackson. Misrepresenting
God. Trust reason ; The Oversoul; God’s door.

^ Right and wrong way to make Christ loved. Quo-
tatiofis from Bacon. Threads tie the Universe.
CaTnpbell. Justified books. Reputation. Adams’s Eulogy
on Monroe. "I'emperance, Silence; Speech; Poverty.
Education. Coming Death. Who Knovveth ? Origin of
Sunday Schools. Everyman’s gauge. Miracles. Com-
pensation. Elevated and clear writing. P?st3lozzi on
effect of surroundings. The moral law jj^finite. Verses,
The \lines Truth, Non-resistance; Judge eachj?y
his law. Creeds or Commandments ; Calviniftn ;
Heaven here. Quotations ; Schelli^g, Landor^ (ficero,
Shakespqdrc’s Sonnets. Formal and polemic \yor8hip ;
Calvinism and ITnitari^liism; the St)urs worship. Derry
Academy; limitations; tfuswour instyicts® Abide your
time. Your Future iKjj-e. Exchanges of pulpit. Robert
Burns, Words\vorth, pAise and criticism. Madam
Emerson^ remark. Mayhew School-Committee.
Prayer should be entrance into God’s mind. Origin

CONTENTS

,xjv

of poem Compensation. Elevation in sorrow; Ellen's
words. ‘Subjects for Sermons; the unseen good in
man ; feal wisdom and ignorance ; love of nature ; *
coinci<ience bf first and third thoughts ; uneven char-
acter ; firsthand second thoughts. Charles Emerson's^
departure. Conferring favours. Parochial memoranda.
God’s orderly univci’-se. Preach and practice. Visits
to sick and dying; ffer of death. Sentences and quo-
tations. Extempore Speaking. Letter to Aunt Mary:
Montaigne; wild vigour versus talking from memory.

The closing year. Faith. Robert Haskins’s proverb.
Reading . ^ . . 353

JOURNAL XXIII
183a

The unsaid part of the discourse. Death. George Brad-
ford. The proposed book. Acquaintances. Mental crys-
tallization. Mendelssohn’s Reading. Dreams.

Ministerial ^< 3 Vids. Native vigour in Speech. True
Philosophy. Dangerous Power. Brave independence ;
cowardly courtesies. Dreams and Beasts. Tcavcl over-
estimated. The house-hero. Utilitarianism. Reality of
Duty. Talk with Sampson Reed and Thomas Worcester
on Spirits. Qhanning on War. To each his gift. J-.etter
to Elizabeth Tucker advising reading, t — Monitofs:
Thomas a Kem|jis, Scougal, X^yl«T, Fenelon, Browne,
Young, Ware ; History .-•^Muller, Robertson, Hume,
Napoleon^ New Hampshire y Morton’s

New Englandy Milman ; Natural History: Brougham,
Hcrschcl, Nuttall, etc. ; Novels :*Scott, Edgpworth, etc. ;

CONTENTS

Peltry: Milton, Bryant, Cowper, Thomson, Words-
worth. Poverty and Riches. A wise man^s matter. ‘
^est opinions prevail 'at last ; Newton ; Leonardo da
Vinci. Each finds h^*s own in books. Nothing is n<^w.
Galileo. Unanswered questions. Sin. Temperance. The
Unsatis^ck Mackintosh; creeds as scaffoldings, Moore
on Campbelf. Suum^cuique* Abernethy qn flies. Ser-
mon subjects. Animals, Idleness. The fSree within.
Naturfe teaches physician. Persian Scriptures. Pesta-
Ipzzi. Stand tofour thought; humility, human relations.
Expression. Sermons. Porto Rico. A thought under
another name. Symbols. Be master. Hobby-riding.
Wonder. Woman. Blessed poverty. Spanish proverbs.
Truth coming. Shakspeare’s creations. Know to like.
New ligh^f. Envy unreasonable. Constancy. Con-
cealment, The Present. The Point of view. Jortin.
Missionaries. The Miracle of the Universe, Science
^thical ; Design ; Astronomy, effect on religion. Crisis
ici Emerson’s life ; to the mountains for help ; Medi-
tations ; the stirring of thought; inspiration of Nature.
Sunday at the inn. The question of the Lord’s^Supper.
^eorge FoMi God tfi^ Soul. Truth immortal. Repairs,
Wdily and spiritual. Real Antiquity. Design for a modern
Plutarch. Ideal men. Speak your own word. Cholera*
times ; value of death and of life. Be genuine. Subject ^r
a Sermon, \^atcfi for finj senyment cverjjwlvere. Inner
meaning of texts ; dftjectlve th^^logy a discijilinq ; the
soul reserves* her word. Hypocrisy, ^designation of
pastorate. Christianity educate* and frees. Differing
gifts, ‘‘ Think jf Living,” the present duty, the un-
known future. Your powers yowr horoscope. Seek

XV

xvi CONTENTS

■ truth, do generously, have faith, the great have had
Let God speak through us. First reading of Carlyle.
ScJvereignty of ethics ; Truth precedes Christianity.
*Tlle terrible freedom. *‘Teach by bggrees. * * Use God’s
riche|. Resolves. Verses, Self-Reliance. Quotations
from Lander. Problems of a minister. The Lig^t within,
l|t it direct your way ; it leads to common goal, imi-
tators.* Thougfht and speech. Nothing within. Truth
many-sided. The noble heart ; Carlyle. Mary Moody
Emerson. Resignation of Pastorate accepted. Schiller.
Pope’s, couplet. Public concern, or private ? Wasted
life. Little thoughts. War. Aphorisms.
tus. Margaret Tucker’s death. A winter’s day. Words-
worth. Compulsory mathematics. Winter’s day ag^iin.
Letter to George A. Sampson on influence of solitude.
Notice of Miss Tucker. Reading . . • .

ILLUSTRATIONS

Madam Emerson (Ruth Haskins), Widcw of Pev.
William Emerson and Mother of Ralph Waldo
Emerson. (^Pj^otogravure') Frontispiece

From a miniature^ painted about 1840 ,* artist . un-
known.

Prince Napoleon Achille Murat 188

From a print after a painting in the Public Library of
Tallahassee^ Florida.

Ellen Tucker. (^Photogravure') 256

From a miniature y painted in /82py artist unkno^wn.

The Second Church of Boston (Old North)*, in
Hai«over Street, where Emerson was Pasi» 5 r • . 424

JOURNAL

TEACHER AND DIVINITY
' STUDENT

JOURrJsrAL XV

»

(The lastjjalfof 1824, from “XV,” “XVI,” ahi
“XVIII,” 2d)

[For the next few years, Ivlr. En?erson*kept
several Journals or note-books, the distinction
between which*5s not strictly followed, with en-
'trifs of dates ccjyering several years. Thqj-efore
it seems better to avoid confusion by grouping
the selections by years, rather than by separate
note-books.. It will be specified from what
manuscript book the selections for each year
were taken.

ft must be understood, then, that, in this
part of the work, the heading for eacli ^ear

given by the editors, Journal , ^es not

signify a separate ijianuscript, but a combina-,
tiqn; and yet, unfortunately, three of the jour^
nals tliat are here drawn up6n hav« the Roman
numerals xv, x^, and xviii, 2 d, givan by Mr.
Emerson.]

4

JOURNAL

[AgF 2 1

R. W. E. TO MISS EMERSON^

(From ‘^XVJir’)

July 26, 1824.

... I suppose it jarred no chord in the
Vale * when Byron died, a man of dreadful his-
tory,<who ’eft no brighter genius behind him
than is gone, and no such blasphemer of heaven
or pander to sensuality. But the light of ,sub-
limer ' existence was on his cheek, even in his
sarcastic beastliness and coarse sneers, nor seemed
less than archangel ruined, and the excess of
glory obscured. It is one of the hardest errors
to get rid of, — the admiration of intellectual
excellence though depraved, and one cause is,
there seems to be no reason why a spirit should
be finely touched for such poor issues. Ohe is
glad of eternity, when we find so much to learn.
But it is melancholy to have your well dry up,
your fountain stopped from whence you were
wont to look for an unfailing supply. Men
marvel at, Scott’s never-ending traditions, but
they set no bounds co their expectation from
Byron’s crfeative genius. Wit, argument, history,

I “The Vale” (Waterford, Maine) was the name of
the Haskins farm, in which Miss Emerson had some rights,
and which was long he. place of residence.

i»z4] BOOKS 5

rhaptody, the extremes of good and ill, — every-
thing w^s to be expected from his extraordinary
invention. He •mijght have added one, mgre
wonder to his life — its own redemption. And
now he l%«dead, and is seeing the ,secrets hjj
paramcrurit genius, dared to brave. It is terrible
in example to presume as he ha^ done^ it is a
risque not many are willing to run, but it is less
mean and no worse thus to face the things un-
seen, and shaice hands with Lucifer, than to
commit the deed, and love the lust, and shake
at the contumely of being over-good, and refuse
to speak out all the time out of fear of being
struck d^ad.

[books of the centuries]

(From “XVI”)

Octobergi 18124 .

>‘By boAks,” says the gentle Shepherd, “J
crack with kings.” 'T is a godlike inverijtibn
whi(?h thus annihilates to all purposes of mental
improvement '^oth space and dmo; and Offers
the solitary schcHar by tlwesj silent interpreters

to converse 'with minds who illuminated the be-

%

ginnings of the world- My memory goes back
to a past imnfbrtality, and I almost realize the
perfection of a spiritual intercoivse which gains

6 JOURNAL [Ace^zi

all the good, and lacks all the incopver.ience
and disgust of close society of imperfect beings.
We'a»’e then likest to the Image of God, for in
this grateful rapidity of thought a thousand
, years becpme one day. Providenc'* lias equi-
tably distributed the highest order of minds
along successive periods of time, and not clus-
tered them all into one fortunate age. Hereby
their potent influence enlightens* the dark ‘and
cheers J:he gloom of barbarism, ^ut an evil con-
sequence ensues, that they are deprived of that
splendid enjoyment which their equal society
would afford them. But, as they everywhere
rise above the sinking mass in which they stand,
the eye of the distant historian associates them
together, as in a distant prospect the vast.in-
terve<ping lowlands vanish and the mountains
tower abv^ve them, seeming to come together in
tolemn and sublime society.

[a man]

. I am partial to one sort of portrait. ... I
like the image my fancy presents hie of a wise
man, well bred- to a vast variety of'sound learn-
ing, carrying through sun and rain, through his
rambles and business, anil animal refections
and filthy occupations, through visits of cere-

,|24] EACH AND ALL 7

mon^, and all the attitudes into which the ver-
satile scene of life^ may throw him, — his
that rich world oft thought; that subtje* aiid
elegant arrangement of conceptions, ripe for
communtiofition so soon as another spirit is pre*-
sented.* I' like an unity of purpose in a ijian
like the oft repeated warning of* Cato* “It is
also my opinion that Carthage should be de-
strbyed.” Scipio also. Mr. Wilberforce never
speaks in British Parliament but for* slaves.
Mr. Everett is the expounder of a certain prac-
tical philosophy which always breaks forth in-
(ydentally^or in the plan of all his productions.
In VoltalVe, they who have vainly sought for
any unity of character or object have been re-
duced to fix it in the absolute disregard of all
character, object and truth. Anacreon tjjed to
sing ,of heroes, but his lyre responided only
Lave; By/pn’s lyre returned but one sublime
note, and it was hatred. He dreamed by ^day
and* by night but one dreamf himself. He
hated all otheft and also himself.

[each and all^

In God’s system, tKie* virtue pervades the
whole world, and none so poor as not to par-
take : if not opulent, he may, impart of his

8 JOURNAL [Age^2i

I

wisdom ; if foolish, of his strength, and sotthor-
oughly social is our constitution that scarce an'
infant, or idiot exists whoi.cantiot somehow' or
other contribute, to the well-being of the uni-‘
^ers'e. Al) are inevitably amenable ta the Author
of, their pow^ for the right use of if, and chiefly,
or in fhe highest degree, those who have most
liberally received. Are you then chief among ten
thousand in the rarest endowments of genius,
of wealth, of power, of accomplishments ? You
are but the wider channels through which the
streams of his goodness flow. It was a noble
saying of a Stoic that wise men are the perpet-
ual priests of the gods.

Tiberius forbade they should consult the
Sybiljipe books about the Inundation ^^perinde
divina hninanaque obtegens , . . ut callidum ejus
ingenium^ ita anxium judicmvt.” The Spanish
thUips have been Tiberii. Austria today is i^'i-
berian. 'T is co true'and common and so 'bad a
.cortibinatio^i of real human elements that Tacitus

I I ,

might have wrought up, as Xenophon did the
character of Cyrus, exempli causa.

Candidus insuetum ‘miratur limen Olympi,

Sub pedibusque videt nubes et sic^era Daphnis.

Jpud Leibkitz, de Bayle.

TRUTH ?

9

ilte4]

[questionings]

(Continijed from “ XV ”) •

October 8, 18^4.

It is a ^striking feature in oiir condition •that
we so hardTy,arrive at truth. . . . The'final caus^
of this IS, no doubt, found»in the'doctripe tTiat
we were not sent into this world for the discov-
ery^of truth, hpt for the education of our minds,
and our faculties are best exercised by doubts,
not by facts. T*he immediate consequence of this
arrangement, like all other parts of human na-
ture, has its admixture of evil. It is productive
of that scepticism which throughout the world
combats the advancement of truth. What you
say is probable, says the Pyrrhonian, but the
interval is always infinite between the highest
probability and certainty. I will not ^pifounce
my oW opinion for what may be an error. Prove
it*true, and’I will be converted.

in opposition to this scepticism, in science,
reason fights wjth truth; in religionJ[with^qpn-
science. WJien a pure creed is ‘proposed and

1 The young literary man pleased by* putting a

large part of the journal from Which the next pages are taken
into the form of a publication like the Spectator or Rambler^
though without senous thought of its ever appearing in print :
it was purely for pleasure *and practice.

lO JOURNAL [Ace

' I

accepted by the multitude, in whom t,he jforce
of truth and conscience ordinarily overbalances
the anjbition of doubting, the 4nfidelity of fne
wise, who alone .are privy to the full force of
objections, is commonly kept a secret among
the^mselves. That the number of av6wed, infidels
is smafl must not be esteemed decisive on the
success of Christianity. On the contrary, there
are few men who cannot numbef in the small
circle of their acquaintance one ojjmore sceptic^.
There are few Christians indeed who have not
nourished, if they don't now nourish, a latent
scepticism as to some portions of* their sys-
tem. . . .

When one considers that such is the consti-
tution of the human mind that physical truth,
even ,when established by experiments of inva-
riable slApess, is forced to encounter innu^jnera-
»ble obstacles from vulgar prejudice, as in, the
instance of vaccination, of Czar Peter’s canals,
of Harvey’s Wood-circulation, and the like, and
«in5? great^force is added to the apprehension
that a metaphysical /heoldgiaal cr&d will not
prosper but against infinite odds, ‘a doubt may
very naturally arise whether God would leave his
dispensation of such immeasurable moment to
his creatures, tp struggle against this mighty bias

;\| 24 ] CHRISTIANITY ii

with so smati chances of success. The more this
objection is weighed, the more its force wiH be
fek. are sojuifch the creatures of educa’tion
that we find it hare? to put ourselves in the place
of those j^ho lived under the imperfect religions
of paganisms Christianity is so much' adapted to
the course of huhian feeWngs tli»t it nequires
more discrimination than we are perhaps mas-
ters of to separate its fruits from the native
promptings of humanity. There are moments
in the life of every reflecting man wherein he
seems jto see farthest into the intellectual world,
when his convictions of the existence of God
a'nd his o*vn relations to him rise upon his mind
with far greater force than they are accustomed
tt) exert. But it is by no means certain that the
mind of the old idolaters ached for any inspira-
tion, or accused philosophy and natur^s^^th any
en^Rasis fpr their scanty revelations.

* Providence supports, but does not spoil its
children. We are called sons, i^t darlings* of
the Deity. There is ever good in s(;pre forj^bose
who love rt; knpwledgtf for thdSe who seek it;
and if we do evil, we suffdlr t^e ctmsfequences
of evil. Throughout the, administration of the
world there i§ the 'same aspect of stern kind-
ness; of good against your will; good 'against

12 JOURNAL [Age /i

your good; ten thousand channels of active
beneficence, but all flowing with the same regard
to general, not particular, pi'ofit. . . .

*An6 to such an extent fe this great statute
policy' of God carried, that many, naj^ most of
fhe great blessings of humanity require cycles of
a thousand yeWs to bring the'm to their height.
. . . The arts which do exalt and lengthen life
by carrying on the old landmarks of thought
to new stations, make a vast difference in the

* f •

existence of the ist and the 6oth Century. Yet
all these truths, of such vast consequence^ to our
improvement, lay hid. The Compps, Press,
Steam Engine; Astronomy, Mathematics, Poli-
tics, have scarce begun to exist till within a thou-
sand years. Yet the principles of which they
are results are surely in our nature. “ Nature,”
said BLtke, “ is never more truly herself than
in her grandest forms. The Apollg Belvidere
is^as much in Nature as any figure from tfte
peribil of Rembrandt, or any clown in the rpstic
rev^ of Teniers.” It is our nature to eat bread,
yet the making* of this substance is a^very artifi-
cial process.* “ jyiafi fias no natural food,” but
was expected to convprtf inedible to edible sub-
stances. Thus, too, God has done with the re-
ligious education of men ; h^ has sowed truth in

1^24] BOOKS AND MEN 13

the world, 6 ut has let them arrive at it by the
slow*instrumentality of human research. Such
is<he \rtse remark Origen. . . .

[books and men]

The ^ great library of books that is in ^he
world, instead of ihaking atl mankind wi«er and
better, is addressed for the most part to a very
small minority of men, to the learned alone. In
so great a mass of works, doubtless every appe-
tite must be suited, and so we find a portion
which ^seems specially intended for coxcombs
and deficknt persons. To this department be-
long the greatest part of Novels and Romances,
and all that part of the English Drama which
is* called Living Plays. . . . But the third class
of men, the great body of society who niake up
nations and conduct the business of ti> 5 ?^orld,
these*are legist conjsulted in the composition of
bdoks. The immense importance of this ord€r
of njen makes them indeed the jubject qf au-
thors ; they foim the groundwork of thei^ rea-
sonings, and from them Hlustratiftns are quoted.
But the books written on fheqj n*ot writ-
ten to them. Authors ^rite to authors. And
as this Order to use a local term), this Mid-
dling Interest of mankind, afe immersed in daily

14 JOURNAL [Age

labours for daily bread, they seldom have the
will "or power to take up the pen in their turn.
The' consequence often is that; they ulter die
same complaint as the Lion*' in the fable, that
“ if thfey were painters,” etc.

f

[wjt'iTiNG COR Americans]

Now this oversight of the greatest "human
interests might be excused by those political
imperfections which were its cause as long as
they lasted. It cannot now be excused. That
portion of the community which all over Europe
is called the Third Estate, has righted itself, by
God’s aid, in America, and has absorbed into
itself the old distinctions of nobility and office.
We have plucked down Fortune and set up
Nature in his room. Consider who are the pa-
trons muse. Not a frivolous dowager

c^een, not an imbecile baby, born, ^prsoo?h,^in
a >oyal bed, is now to be flattered in florid proSe
or lying rhyn\f , — then I had been silenf, —
but lo add^ss a great nation risen from the
dust and sitting in absolute judgment on the
merits of men,, ready to hear if any one offers
good counsel, may rousd the ambition and ex-
ercise the understanding of a maij. It is fit that
something besides ifewspapers should be put

IMh] a new “SPECTATOR” 15

• •

into^the hands of the people. It were well if
short practical treatises on a hundred topics, all
of^ prinJary imjwrt^ce, could make thet^prize
what all the worlS covets. In the Capital of
New England are many individuals who *both
serve ajid* adorn their country. I have waite<| to
hear them speak, But they are silerft ; the hours
are pas'sing that should complete our education,
the moment ^f instilling wholesome principles
may not return. I shall therefore attenjpt in a
series of papers to discuss, in a popular manner,
some gf those practical questions of daily recur-
rence, mofal, political and literary, which best
deserve the attention of my countrymen.

It is now a hundred years since the Spec-
iator was found duly laid on every plate in the
coffee houses and palaces of London. Jt was a
book daily read by near fifty thousai>^^eople
of^every conditioq, and being a book of faultless
persuasive morality and a sharp censor of fasfl-
ion^le vices, it operated with gre^gt force gh^the
side of virtue.*The common accouiits say 4:ha{
14,000, soKietinvps Tio,©^)© Spectators were sold
in a day. Sirpposing that four p^sofis read each
copy (and though som^ were no doubt read by
less, others w^re read by many more), we shall
have each of those* moral lessons read by more

l6 JQURNAL [Age ih

* <

than 50 ,ocx) persons. Since, the numberjias^been
indefinitely multiplied.

^Sqmetimes, as seasons /and circurhstanCes
change, I shall smile ; sometimes I shall laugh,
and ‘tftat heartily ; but my readers n»<!:y expect
th^ my garrulous humour may gdt the upper
hand of my Tnoral turn, and vent itself in anec-
dotes of myself and my friends, living and dead,
in this and every age. And that which I reckon
my chief recommendation is the confidence my
reader may entertain of finding me his friend.
I shall appear every evening at his te^-table,
always speaking to him in the frankness of love,
and communicating to him my choicest observa-
tions on men and manners. He who reflects
what numbers are made miserable by the unhap-
piness qf missing those offices of kindness ’t is a
friend’s'^ity to perform, and who considers that
the best and most consolatory use of friendsj;iip
is^'the unreserved communication of thoughts,
will not lightly#esteem this overture I have made
VI the sincese desire of soothing«discontent and
sweetening solitude.

I have ever keen noted for my fondness for
children, and childrer. are always fond of me.
Nature has so vigilantly prbvided for the care
of children in the affections of parents that, at a

1V24] A NEW “SPECTATOR” 17

t J

certain season of life, these irrepressible feelings
break forth in bachelors also and secure a tHou-
safid eiTdearmeiats tp*" the child that comes in
their way. ’T is Hkc, my brother used to tell
me, the ^ong instinct of sea-shells whrch ac-
company -the hoarse murmur of their nadve
Ocean, though far removedYrom its^ocial abodes
and though withered and dried up in cabi-
nets. . . .

And if ever, in administering to the wants of
one class of my readers, I should offend another,
I must asl^ their charity beforehand for my case,
answering, as I must, such different demands;
and it becomes me, like the old lady who wor-
shipped the picture of St. Michael, while I hold
up one candle to the Saint, to hold another to
the dragon. I shall also allow myself a lati-
tude as to relate tq my younger readers occasion-
afly certain old stories which I heard in GermafTy
touching the Trollfolk and the J;df gentr^y^' that
yet lurk in sonve corners of that ancient empire^
for I spit »t the ;5celpticftm of thTe moderns.

i8

JOURNAL

[Acs

CIVILIZATION, MORAL.

If we fulfil the expectations of mUnkitid,
we flatter ourselves we have fAlfilled the demand
of d%i£y. Especially are we liable to^his self-
Jeception when the tone of feeling in society
runs with any strong Current towards the natural
obligations of conscience. And now when Virtue
has iclaty and Fashion itself has taken the Cross,
there is^ indeed danger lest we mistake our con-
formity to this prevalent correct taste for the
fruits of severe and ineradicable principles.^Those
sacred rules of life, companions of its ^orrow and
its well-being, companions and elements of its
eternity, the objects of its present probation, the
ties by which ’tis to be bound to the Univer^
of Good beings, are not thus easily put on and
oflF, wiKiimhe succession of insignificant opinions
and the customs of high life.. They, are sTowly
^•med by many sacrifices of self, by many vic-
tories, over thf rebellion of fashion, and fheir
genuineness is ever to be suspected when of
hasty growth. ’

It is perilous for* Religion to be a fashion, as
it is apt to lead men to irrors both in the nature
and in the degree of their virtue. ,

,^4] THOUGHT AND ACTION 19

SOCIETY OR SOLITUDE?

]» propose to write presently on the use ' of
,our powers and passions, on abstinence^ an'd
action, on hermits and men of affairs.' I prO'
pose to remember that ’t is one thinjg to stifle*
and another to direct a prepensitfy# I prppdie
to look philosophically at the conduct of life ; to
remember [thjt] to the course of the meanest
.all the high rules of the theorist can be applied;
and [to write] *of the acceptance that sedulous
action will find on high beside shiftless con-
templation, and infer a law whether either life
be embraced, or a golden mean preserved. Ad-
mit the exception of possibility of sublime
virtue in absolute inaction, when inaction is
martyrdom, but scrupulously exclude the claim
of conceited or deceived indolence. A train
of finll Causes in the rewards attached to action.
(Ef^hhorn — relatively and absolutely.)

I L’etendue des coniioissanccs • dans les^tcmps modcrncs
ne fait qu’affoiblir caractere quand il n’est gas fortifiej>ar
r habitude des affaires et I/excr^ice de la Molonte. Tout voir*
et tout comprendre une grange jaison d’ipcerytudc ; et
I’encrgic de Taction nc se developpe ^e dans ccs con-
trees libres et puissantes ou les stfutinients patriotiques sont
dans Tame, comme^ le sang dans les veines, et ne se glacent
qu^avee la vie. — Mme. STAEL^s*G/r/wj/3[y. (R. W. E.)

20

JOURNAL

[Age 1 1

FINAL CAUSES

' Ignorance is not a malady contracted on the .
earth j nor an incidental defect for^n to the
^purpose qf our existence, but is an original want
with which »ve were^ created,’ and whicH it is a
chief business of life to supply. As hunger
stimulates us to procure the food* appointed for
our sustenance, ignorance is but an appetite
which God made us to gratify. ! . .

[method in study]

»

December j, 1824.

I may digress, where all is digression, to utter
a wish not altogether fruitless, that there might
be an .order introduced into the mass of read-
ing tfhn^occupies or impends over me. It was
z reasonable advice that a scholar, gave me to
'build in the studies of a day ; to begin vJith
solid labour ;t Hebrew and Greek; theological
criticism, moral philosophy and laborious writ-
ing should succeed; then hisfory; -then elegant
letters-^ — that rpecies of books which is at once
the most elevated ^arffusement and the most
productive suggester of thought, of which the
instant specimens * are th& bulk of Johnson’s

,\z4] PLAN OF STUDY ai

• *

works, as Lives of Poets, Rambler, etc., Pope's
Moral Essays, and conspicuously Montaigne’s
Essays.* Thus aiucV for the day. But wlj^t ar-
rangement in priority of subjects? When shall
I read Qjjsek, when Roman, when Ausfrian^
when Ecclesiastical, when Amencaif history ?
Whilst we deliberate, time escapes. ^A po6r plan
is better than none, as a poor law. I propose,
therefore, evtfry morning before breakfast to
read a chapter in Greek Testament with its
Commentary. Afterwards, if time serve, Le
Clerc; or my reading and writing for disserta-
tions; then Mitford(all history is Ecclesiastical,
and all reasonings go back to Greece), and the
day end with Milton, Shakspere, Cicero or
Everett, Burke, Mackintosh, Playfair, Stewart,
Scott, Pope, Dryden. . . .

TIME

December lo.

I Confess I am a little cynical cm some topics,
and when a wh^le nation is roaring-Patriotlsm*
at the top of its voice, I fain to explore the
cleanness of its hands and purity* of its heart. I
have generally found the*gravest and most useful
citizens are not the* easiest provoked to swell
the noise, though they may* be punctual at the

22 JOURNAL [Acb€i

• •

polls. And I have sometimes thought the elec-
tioh an individual makes between right and
wrong more important thaji h«5 choice'betwten
rival statesmen, and that theloss of a novel train-
of Ki ought was ill paid by a considejiable pecu-
niary gairt. It is pleasant to know whatsis doing
in the* world, and why should a world go on if
it does no good? The man whom your vote
supports is to govern some millions — and it
would be laughable not to know the issue of
the naval battle. .In ten years this great compe-
tition will be very stale, and a few words will
inform you the result which cost ypu so many
columns of the newsprints, so many anxious
conjectures. Your soul will last longer than
the ship ; and will value its just and philb-
sophicfl associations long after the memory has
spurn^y^ all obtrusive and burdensome con-
tents. . . .

A

[fragment for use in a sermon].

A celebcated English preachnr, whose praise
is in your ch\irches, 6losed jiis discourse with
a bold ippfial lyhich t^e fervour of his eloquence
permitted, to the passhms and imaginations of
his hearers. He pointed their /ninds’ eyes to
the Recordings Angel who .waited on the wing

GOD PRESENT

1824]

23

in th^ mijcist of the assembly to write down som-e
name of all that multitude in his book of Life.
“ And sTaall he wait ’in vain ? ” he said, “anji will
you let him take his departure for heaven with-
out making him the witness of a single soul’con-
verted /rom' his sins ? ” My friendaf we know
that his sentiment was but a flight of oratory,
natural enough to a fervid spirit, and which the
urgency of fhe occasion might excuse. My
friends, no Recording Angel that we kpow of
hovers over our assembly, but a greater than
An Angel is here. There is one in the midst of
us, though your eyes see him not, who is not a
fictitious 6r an imaginary being, but who is too
^reat and too glorious for our eyes to bear.
There is one here, imparting to us the life and
sense we at this moment exercise, whpse tre-
mendous power set yonder sun in tkJ firma-
mjyit, and •upholds him and us. You cannot
discern him by the gross orbs of sight, but erfn
you" not feel the weight of his p«:sence sinlcing
on your heart ^does no conscious feeling stir ii)
your bosofns under the’eye of your Author and
God, who is here? What doth he here? 'and how
shall we acknowledge the 'almighty mind? . . .

24

JOURNAL

[Ace ii

IMAGINATION

I gyopose to write an Essay *on the fivils ‘of
Imagination, which, after such a panegyrick on
this beautiful faculty as it easily shall ^mit, may
tre^t of tiose egregious errors that, growing
out of'some'favourite fancy, bave shot up into
whole systems of philosophy or bodies of divin-
ity, and have obstructed truth for*thousands- of
years. .The Essay should exemplify its state-
ment by some of the most signal instances of
this capacity in which the imagination has held
the Reason of Man.' Thus the picturesque
dogma of a ruined world has had a Inost per-
nicious fascination over nations of believers. It
was an error locked with their life. They gave
up the, ghost for the love of this lye. And it
clings,"^ this day, in the high places of l^now-

• “Man,” says Brown, “loves w'nat is simple much,* tut
he ^pyc8 what is mysterious more. ♦lam persuaded,* said
Fontenelle, ♦ that,«lf the majority of mankind could be made
{o sec the ord^ of the universe such as^ftt is, as they would
not remark in it any virtues attached to certainunumbers, nor
any properdes inherent irt certain planets, nor. fatalities in cer-
tain times and revolutions of these, they would not be able to
restrain themselves on the sight of this admirable regularity
and beauty from crying out with astonishfnent, ♦♦ What ! is
this all ? — Brown’s Philosophy (R. W. E.).

1824] EVILS OF^ IMAGINATION 25

ledge, an 4 refinement. Hence the avidity witfi
* which tales of wonder are caught and propa-
ga?ed. Hence GibJjon’s remark that mso of
imagination are dogmatic. See, on this subject,
one of Stowart’s Introductory Chapters in the.
Philosophy.* See Mr. Huqje’s reai^i^s on the
agreeableness of the feelings engaged. — tZhap-
ter on Miracles, and some of the fables an-
ciently recounted touching Memnon’s marble
harp, renowned of old, and the oracles of Dodona
and Delphos, and the histories of enchanters,
ghosts and stars. Le Saurin called Earth the
“scaffold of divine Vengeance”;’ also, e. g.,
“Nature a 1 )hors a vacuum.” . . . On this head,
consult the Introductory Lectures of Brown’s
Philosophy. Quietists, Essenes, Quakers, Swe-
denborgians. Vide Prideaux. For Proselytism
and [fissions see Vattel, p. 219.

Christ came not unforeseen by the ancierv*'
prophets, whose eyes had caught a glimpse'bf
blessed light agross the cloud o? futurity. , A
thousand ygars brooded over the* prophecy ere
the event was matured.

1 Origcn, conforming himsc/T tQ the extravagancies of his
time, shews the necessity of 4 gospels, from 4 winds, 4 pil-
lars of a house, an ^ ransacks nature^and nonsense for resem-
blances of the Cross, (R. W. E.)

26

JOURNAL

#

[Age zi

PROVIDENCE

, Another remark which hflohgs to the Ecbn-»
om^ pf Providence is the cheapness (if the ex-
,pression may be used) with which it^operations
arr'. perfo\lT^©d. A ^lan conyersant in books of
history must often have deplored the immense
expense of wit, of time, that are incurred by us
to promote any designs of considerable extent.
If a legislator would relieve the necessities of a
thousand paupers he has the task of life, and of
all his abilities, and of many more lives and
minds than his own. Much of his labour is mere
experiment, and much therefore ofdiis labour
is lost. Private and public subscriptions which
searched the charity and taxed the means of a
whole nation may leave the evil as bad or worse
than it^as found. . . . Does Providence, botch
»up its broken or disordered machinery with-rfhe
sape awkwardness, miscalculation and prodigal
expense? LdOk a little at its vast and serene
'policy, and see how it answers the same end
which we have seen^ human v,'isdom toiling to

1 »i , O

gain. As if to' delight jtself with the exhibition
of its contrivance, it brings all men into life pau-
pers. Not destitute of wealth alone, but in the
destitution of r.ll faculties of action and capacities

i8*4] THf: AUNT’S REPROOF 27

of thought and enjoyment, without virtue, affec-
tion, ki\owledge or passion. This deplorable
poverty it is th^ pfftposed problem to reKe^4e,
and it may furnish amusement to many .hours
of Idleness^ in him that once thought life weari-»
some, to detect tl\e beauty and «i^^licity »f
the means whereby it is done. (Read Rousseau’s
— Rousseau the unrivalled observer of
infantile development, — and Buffon, the in-
genious and b^evolent describer of the growth
and habits of animals.)

.Faith isjk telescope.

[Here follows part of a letter which Miss
Emerson, stirred by some daring heterodoxy in
his (lost) letter, wrote to her nephew, nowon the
eve oi^entering the Cambridge Divinity School.]

(From « XVIII,” zd)

W ATERFOR D,**M AINE,'

December 1824.’

He talks of thS Holy Ghost. God of, Mercy
what a subject ! Holy G|jost given to every man
in Eden ; it was lost in the great contest going
on in the vast ’universe ; it^was lost, stifled; it
was fegiven, embodied in the assumed humanity

28 JOURNAL [Age 21

of the Son of God, and since — the reward of
prayer, agony, self-immolation ! Dost not like
the faith and the means? -JTake thy own — or
rather the dictates of fashion. Let those who
Jove the voice of uncorrupt nature »s.ek for su-
p>'rnal aiuTr-,for an dliance with the'most pow-
erful of spirits — the Holy Ghost. Such was the
ambition of Paul — of holy martyrs — it burnt
up every earthly element, and would not stoop
to ask. an angel’s record nor anj^ngel’s wreath.
Would to God thou wert more ambitious — re-
spected thyself more and the world less. Thou
wouldst not to Cambridge. True they use the
name **Chris^o” but that venerable institution, it
is thought, has become but a feeble, ornamented
arch in the great temple which the Christian
world maintains to the honour of his name. It is
but a garnished sepulchre where may bejbund
.some relics of the body of Jecus — jome grQsser
puts which he took not at his ascent, and which
[the College] will be forgotten and buried for-
ev’er beneath the flowrets of genius and learn-
ing, if the master spirits of cuch as Appleton,
Chalmers and Stewart and the consecrated Chan-
ning do not rescue it by a crusade of faith and
lofty devotion. The nature and limits of human
virtue, its dangers, its orifjin — “questions an-

,824] MISS EMERSON’S LETTER 29

I • ^

swered at Cambridge — easily ” God forgive thy
child* his levity ! — subjects veiled with some-
thing oT Thine ,owlj awful incomprehensibility,
soothed only by the faith which reason loves,
but can Qever describe, which rests in sofiemn
delight on Him who not once calcy^ted it Jor
any earthly emolument.

This was written with the pen taken for the
old almanack** at the moment of reading yours
of antediluvian date. Then you do not go to
Stewart [at Andover]. You might like him,
though he makes mouths at the heartless . . .
kindnesseg which tickle, not benefit, the weak
world. Hfe thinks a man in pursuit of greatness
feels no little wants. Why did you not study
lindcr the wing of Channing which was never
pruned at Cambridge? If he advised Cambridge;
. . . Alas that you are there ! There is a tide in

the affairs of men who connect the soul to the
.* . * •
future, which, taken at the moment, bears onVo

fortune; omitted, the rest may bf;shallowg.*T)o

we repine that»so much is depender^t on mortal

life? The«reaso^n we cin’t deteVmine, yet that

this dread responsibility is hot gxtehde’d, is not

lengthened to the unknown world, is matter of

constant gratitude to those who find terrors in

the. divine law and governnAnt, and in His natu-

30 JOURNAL. [Agb zi

ral attributes. Were this protection to be ex-
tended, as the liberal believe, to those who have
heard of the gospel — of v'hafe reason was that
astonishing apparatus given ? Did not Christian-
ity-^ even as much as the good Ware allows
(vfjiich seuns to leave more difficulties, though
not so frightful as Calvin and the improvements
of Woods) — imply much war with human na-
ture, why do its professed disCiples run into
Atheispi so often, rather than deism? Diluted
as it is, it demands too much lofty and serious
virtue, and, as humanitarianism opens the door
to conclusions most forbidden, they iiiake them.
Price, so eminent, yet so flouted, says Christian-
ity cannot be credible on Lardner’s scheme;
rather does it seem more so if necessarily con-
nected ;jvith the Trinitarian. Blessed be God for
the history, whether the penmen were inspired
or not, of primitive religion i^ the CWd and New
Testaments. A descended being, the Companion
of God befo**^ time, living and suffering as he
.did — giving not an intimation that he provided
for any earthly comfort to- his^disciples, leaving
if but a‘ few of the precepts and engagements
which he did, contains enow to demand constant
martyrdom of speculation' or interest — gives
and does enable its devoted children to look at

18*4] MISS EMERSON’S LETTER 31

death anji hell with sovereignty, to call God;
thougli so tremendously holy, to witness that
whTle he sustains tK^ir fulfilment of his condi-
tions, while they love him thus. He himself can
do nothing against them. This deep and High
theology w^l^ prevail, and German ma^ess mg^
be cured. The public ear, weary of the artifices
of eloquence, will ask for the wants of the soul
to be satisfied.* May you be among others who
■wJH prove a Pharos to your country and^times.
But I wander, because it is a penance, from the
design of writing. It is to say that the years
of levity and pride &c. &c. [which render me
unworthy to speak of the heights of religion] I
cannot but think were, in some measure, owing
to the atmosphere of theology ; to my own
speculation, to what is worse and certain, the
sore of human nature — could years of penitence
restpre me the last .twenty years ! It was pretty,
it seemed best, to tell children how good they'
were’ — the time of illusion arvl childhood
is past, and ytfu will find mysterits in man
which baflk genius.* . May* the God of
your fathers bless you beyond tyour progen-

1 She blames herself for having fostered the (uncalvinistic)
good opinion of thctnselvcs of the Emerson boys in their child-
hood,’ which has unfitted them for tJblief in^ original sin*

32 JOURNAL [Age 21

*itors to the utmost bounds of your u^idying
existence.

[The following is probably an extract from
the nephew’s answer to the foregoing.]

December 17, 1824.

I am blind, I fear, to the truth of a theology
which I can’t but respect for t‘ne eloquence it
begets, and for the heroic life of; its modern, and
the heroic death of its ancient defenders. I ac-
knowledge it tempts the imagination with a high
epic (and better than epic) magnifitence; but it
sounds like mysticism in the ear of understand-
ing. The finite .and flitting kingdoms of this
world may forget in the course of ages their
maxims of government, and annul today the
edict of a thousand years. And none wquld be
surprised if the Rome of the Pop« should^yary
in^ policy from the Rome of the Consuls. But
that the adn>inistraiion of eternity is fickle" ; that
the God of Revelation hath se^n cause to repent
and botch up the oiylinartces of thd'God of Na-
ture — I hold it not irreverent, but impious in
us to assume. Yet? Paley’s deity and Calvin’s
deity are plainly two beings, both sublime exist-
ences, but ooe a friend and the other a foe to

AGAINST CALVIN

i8z4]

33

that capafitjr of order and right, to that under-
‘standin^ which is made in us arbiter of things
seen, the prophet of things unseen. When I s^e
wise and good of all [ages] consenting to a
single creed that taught the infinite perfections
and pategrnal ‘character of God, an(^tl^^accour>-
ableness of man, I cannot help acknowledging
the first and invariable fruit of those means of
information thlht are put in all hands. I cannot
'help revolting from the double deity,, gross
Gothic offspring of some Genevan school. I
suppose you ’ll think me so dazzled by a flam-
beau that k can’t see the sun when I say that
the liberaluy of the age, though it stray into
licentiousness and deism, &c..&c. [The rest is
missing.]

[** forefathers’ day ”]

(“From XVI”)

December ii.

Whose is the bark that comes. over the deep

# •

And lags on the \^aters while winds are asleep
The salt foam scarce ^^hiterls the wake of its keel,
Scarce a motion of ^ir can its»Iopse sail r^ves^l ;

No gay streamers aloft on |ts main-t^p are hung,
No ensign declares whence its* mariners sprung.
Unconvoyed the*dull vessel sails and forlorn,

Her masts have been racked an^ her^anvas is torn.

34 JOURNAL [Age zi

Whose is this bark, and what doth she here
By this winter-bound coast in the night of the year ?
War is not the errand this tr^ifelley brings, *

For her sides are not armed witft the thunders of kings;
Nor* for Commerce she visits yon barbarous shore,
‘Which th' ship of the stranger ne’er greeted before.
iJeav^ gentr], , 'dark Ocean, thou bear’st on thy breast
The hope of mankind to its home in the West.

If the tempest should bury that ship in the deep.

The fortunes of nations beside it should sleep.

For she brings through the vast solil^ides of the sea.
The pride of Old England, the . . .

Authors or Books quoted or r|ferred to
IN Journals of 1824

Bible;

Homer; Anacreon; Euripides;

Horace; Tacitus, Annales ; Juvenal; Origen;
Boethius;

t

Calvin; Montaigne, Essap; Hobbes, Levi-
*dthan ;

Shakspeam; BacOn, Essays, Henry VII';
Miltonf Comus, Paradise Edit, II Penseroso,
Prose Works;

Pascal ;' Cu^worth ; Locke ; •

Newton, Maclaunn'^ Life of;

Leibnitz, Letters; Le Cl^rc; Prideaux;
Wollaston, Religioh of Nature; Massillon;

1824] READING 35

•

Lardper (Rev. Nathaniel ?); Addison; Saurin;
Young; Butler, Analogy;

‘Pope, Essays j and Poems; Montesquieu,
Esprit des Loix ;

Hume, History i Essays; Vattell, La-ao of
Nation^ (?) * Goldsmith, Retaliation^ and l^e-
serted Village;

Burke, Economic Reform; Paley, Natural
Theology; Gibbon; Playfair; Pitt, and Fox,
Speeches ;

Franklin, Ephemeris^ etc.; Dugald Stewart,
Philosophical Essays y Introduction to the Encyclo-
padia ; .

De Stjtel, French Revolution; Mackintosh;
Thomas Brown, Philosophy of the Human Mind;

Byron, Childe Harold; Scott; Hogg ; Words-
worth, Excursion ;

Canning, The Pilot that weathered the Storm;

JSdother Goose,

JOURNAL XVI

1825

(FroiA;^‘XV,” “XVI,” and “XVIM,” 2d)
[reflections]

(From “XV”)

Roxbury, January 4, 1825.

I have closed my school. I have begun a new
year. I have begun my studies, and this day a
moment of indolence engendered in*me phan-
tasms and feelings that struggled to find vent in
rhyme. I thought of the passage of my years,
of their even and eventless tenor, and of the crisis
which i^ but a little way before, when a month
will determine the dark or bright dye they inust
assume forever. I turn now t<:\ my lamp and ^y
tdmes. I have nothing to do with society. My
unpleasing bo^ihood is past, my youth wanes into
t;fie age of man, and what are thft unsuppressed
glee, the cheering games, the golden hair and
shining eyes of youth unto me.^ I withdraw my-
self from their spell. A solemn voice commands
me to retire. And if in tho§e scenes my blood
and brow have beeh cold, ‘if my tongue has

i8z5l REFX-ECTIONS 37

•

stamnjerftd where fashion and gaiety were vol-
ub]e, an<l I have hjid no grace amid the influ-
ences of Beauty 'and *the festivities of Grandeur,
I shall not hastily conclude my soul ignpbly
born and its^horoscope fully cast. I wi^ not yeti
believe that because it has lain so trr^quil^ gr^t
argument could not make it stir. I will not be-
lieve because I cannot unite dignity, as many
can,’ to folly, that I am not born to fill the eye
of great expectation, to speak when the people
listen, nor to cast my mite into the great trea-
sury of morals and intellect. I will not quite
de^spair, no^ quench my flambeau in the dust
of “ Easy live and quiet die,”

Those men to whom the muse has vouchsafed
her inspirations, fail, when they fail, by their
own fault. They have an instrument ili their
handsithat discourses music by whi».h the mul-
titvwie cannftt choftse but be moved. Yet th^
pkyer has sometimes so many freaks, or such
indolence, as to waste his life. If yoti have found
any defect in your sympathies that "puts a bar
between you ancf others, go. and study. to find
those views and feelings in wh*ch you come
nearest to other men. Go and school your pride
and thaw your Icy benevolet^ce, and nurse some-
where in your soul a spark of pare and heroic

3® JOURN4^L [Ace zi

enthusiasm. Ambition and curiosity — ‘th^y will
prompt you to prove by experiments the affec-
tions and faculties you polsress*. You will bind
yourself in friendship ; you will obey the strong
•necessity, of nature and knit yourself to woman
itl^love,* ah4 the exercise of those affections will
open your apprehension to a more common feel-
ing and closer kindred with men. You will ex-
plore your connexion with the world of spirits,
and happy will you be if the flameof ardent piety
toward the Infinite Spirit shall be taught to
glow in your breast. . . .

(From “XVI")

O what have I to do

With merriment and jollities, —

Youth, golden hair and sparkling eyes,

And deafening games that children prize?*

•1 am not made to tune a lute,

Nor ambft in a soft saloon;

Nor nrfne the grace of kind safute
To mien of pride ^nd heart of stoni.

My pulse is»slow, my blood is cold,

My stammering tongue is rudely turned.

1 ** No thoughl»infirm altered his cheek.’* (R. W. E.)

39

18*51 T,AKINp THE VOWS

Man his work, the merry to their wine.

Friend ^ his friend, folly to festivals,

Afl hopes and humors* to their several ends.

Sages to schools, young Passion to its love.

Ambition to its task, and me to mine.

I am not charged with dallying mess^es^

That thus I mingle In this glittering crowd.

Seeing with strange eyes their buffooneries.

I am not tangled in the cobweb net
That wanton Beauty weaves for youth so knit
To some fair ntaid he follows with his ^e.

A sterner errand to the silken troop
Has quenched the uneasy blush that warmed my cheek;
I am comn^ssioned in my day of joy
To leave my woods and streams, and the sweet sloth
Of prayer and song that were my dear delight;

To leave the rudeness of my woodland life.

Sweet twilight walks and midnight solitude
And kind acquaintance with the morning stars.

And tlie glac^ heyday of my household hours, —

The innocent mirth which sweetens daily bread.
Railing in love at those who rail again^

By mind’s industjy sharpening the love of life.

Books, Muses, study, /ireside, friends, and love,

I loved ye with triffe love, so*faKe ye welk

I was a boy; boyhood^ slid gaily by.

And the impatidht years that trod on it
Taught me new lessons in the lore of life.

40 JOURNAL [Age 21

I Ve learned the sum of that sad history
All woman-born do know, that^ hoped for d^s,

D^ys that come dancing on fr«\j[ghf with delights
Dash our blown hopes as they limp heavily by.

JBut 1 — the bantling of a country Muse —

Ai^andon ^ILthose toys with speed, to dbey
The Ring wnose meek ambassador I go.

(From ‘‘XV’’)

[must prosperity rest on^ arms

Pray in your multifarious reading, I<
for an instance to disprove Bacon^s and the
common opinion that the armed nation is a
prosperous one. Gan ye not find in the extent
of time one people, one hour, when a conquered,
unambftious community surpassed the Victor in
comfort, in intelligence, in real enjoyment? It
•(;qncerns the weal of mankind that ^he position
be.denied. ...

£editorial confidences]

When, some . . . pages back?*, my communica-
tive mood was on me, aijd I was fain to take cap-
tive in print, not, as tefore,,one or two compas-
sionate eyes whom accident broug*ht to my page,
but the whole'world of hearts, I attempted to

,THE .EMERSONS

41

1825]

bespeak ^ome kindness for my fortunes by pro-
mising ♦to make th^ reader acquainted with my
friends, my habfts »fid my worldly lot, I frankly
told him that I spurned the vanity of external
greatness, and had no sympathy with effem*
inate soul that was cheated by the t' unmeaning
names of Grace and Majesty. For me, lliad as
lief be the sample Cobbler of Agawam as the
lineal Bourbon of the House of Capet ; and a
thousand timts rather receive my immortal life
from Sophroniscus, the stone-cutter, and his
plain spouse, the midwife, so that I should be
to future i^mes the godlike mind, the Liberator
of the Understanding who sprung from them,
than be any Porphyrogenet of them all. I shall
have future occasion to give a reason of my
dissent from the universal prejudice to Which no
manacan succumb and be wise. I return to my
purpose of*describing my connexions. ^

It is my own humor to despise pedigr^ie. I
was educated to prize it. The kiriUl Aunt ?vhose
cares instructed myjyou^h (and v^horh may God
reward), told mdoft the vktiies of her ajid mine
ancestors. They have Ijeen clergymen for many
generations, and the piety of all and the elo-
quence of mahy is yet praised in the Churches.
But the dead sleep m their moonless night ; my

42 JOURNAL [Age 21

«

business is with the living. The Gehiup that
keeps me, to correct the Jnequalitiesf of tpy
understanding, did not irtake me brother to
clodp of the same shape and texture as myself,
(but to contraries. Thus, one of my house
is^ person iSvf squared and methodical Conduct.*
Another, on whose virtues I shall chiefly insist,*
is an accomplished gentleman pf a restless,
worldly ambition who will not let me dream out

I William, the eldest, on whom from hi? early teens a large
share of the burden of family affairs had fallen. While studying
in Germany, doubts begotten by his philosophic instruction
arose ; so, at the bidding of conscience, though otk irwise advised
by Goethe, whose counsel the youth sought in a special pilgrim-
age to Weimar, he abandoned the hereditary profession and
came home to study law. He practised honourably and suc-
cessfully in New York for many years, in spite of constant ill-
health, the result of his early asceticism on the family’s behalf,
and of unremitting work. He was a gentleman of great probity
and courtesy, and an accomplished scholar. ^

2 Edward Bliss, two years younger than Waldo, hand-
some, eloquent, f^nd a brilliant scholar. He was destined for
the law, and %fudied in Daniel Webster’s- office and was tutor
to his sons ; but his‘ early promise was blighted Ijy disease, and
after years* of broken healthV he died in Porto Rico in 1834.
Emerson in his ** dirge ” (se^ Poems) mourns his

** Brother of the brief but blazing star/’

for accounts of Edward Cabot’s and Holmes’s Memoirs
of Emerson.

,825] . REFLECTIONS 43

^my fii\e-sfpun reveries, but ever and anon jogs
me^and «>aughs aloucj at my metaphysical sloth.
In the acquaintance*! propose to form with my
readers I shall insist on my brothers’ opinions
as often as my own, and without knpwing or.
caring whence spring the differences ki charactcV
between equals in education, or whence fall the
seed of virtues and abilities into the child which
were not seen m the sire, I shall yet try to clothe
'him to the reader’s eye in those attractions and
dignities wherein he appears to my own. The
day is gone by with me — such are the connex-
ions into \i|liich Providence has thrown me —
the day has gone by, when the useless and the
frivolous should command my respect. I know
very well that the great brotherhood of folly in
the world, the idlers, the maniacs and the fools
in society, exercise an influence over the daily
coujTse of events a? vast and intimate as that of
men of study and soul. Since it is not trutivjbut
bread, that mer^ seek, and when Ufead is “pro-
cured, the exercise ^of ^heir faculties delights’
them not so much as lov^ajid pride, it. follows
that very different agenfs enter into the offices
of life from those of which wise men would com-
pose their ideal Commonwealths. A fair skin, a
bank-note, a fashion'able dress, a tapestried par-

44 JOURNAL [Age 21

* . ^

lor, a granite house, cause more steps> and acts

each day and keep more eyelids open night
than all the theories of the French Academy, or
all the lofty images of Paradise Lost. If one
«of those nilly angels that writers sometimes feign,
to help them'out of their difficulties, should be
stationed at the corner of Court Street to inquire
of every passenger the business he was upon, no
doubt .he would marvel much for what ends this
world Was made. For not one in a *housand could
inform him of any mental or moral concern he
had in hand. Every one, whatever bait attract
him, whatever associates accompany him, picks
out his own course, forgets in his own en-
grossing occupations the infinite multitude that
bustles round him. It slips his memory that
there are six hundred times ten hundred thou-
sand persons on the planet : set aside the score
tof people with whom he has habits of familiar
connexion, and the one or two hundred more
with* whom®*he has occasional intercourse, and
’ the rest are of as littlf copsequence to his life
and hit d«ath as ii they were-\he tenants of an-
other globe. 'No inforpiation transmitted from
one man to another can ^be more interesting
than the accurate (description oPthis little world
in which he lies ; and I shall deserve the thanks

i8z5l AN AGE OF HOPE 45

of every ]|c:nowing reader, if I shall shew him thfe
coloui^^rbit, and composition of my particular
staV.

[eVERETt’s PLYMOUTH ORATION, CtC.]*

Jack Cad 4 was not more incline^ to proscribe

Grammar from his domains, than I method from

«

mine. I had a freak three days ago to describe
Tom, Dick aftd Harry, but my freak is clean
•gone by. I have been at an Ordination^ hear-
ing maxims on eloquence till I burned to speak.
I have been reading Everett’s rich strains at
Plymouth,# — gazing at the Sun till my eyes are
blurred. Thisconsentingdeclamation from every
quarter on the auspicious promise of the times ;
this anxious and affectionate watching of the elder
brothers over the painful birth of new nations in
South^ America, Asia, Africa, (this“ transfusion
of youthful ^lood into aged veins ” in Greece),
is an authentic testimony to the reality of the*
good’, or at least to a degree of it. Js is infimtely
better than that*ill-omened cry of warning and
fear that in*the I^Iidflle Age bemoaned an enor-
mous presenfdegeneracy and the<destruction of
the world drawing nigh.* Men congregated to-
gether in processions, fasts, penances, miserecor-
diaSy impressed by the symjSathiej of fear. The

46 JOURNAL [Age 21

tremblers saw nothing in nature but symptoms
of decay ; nothing in the heavens but the torches®
that should light the conf agration. . . .

It is better to go to the house of feasting than
to §uch a house of mourning as that. Sympathy
T dth the wassailers is twice as easy an(d clever.
But for my part, I am sorry that they could not
have remembered the only thing worth remem-
bering in those pall-holders, nainely, their de-
votion. In their tribulation they kneeled to God#
and acknowledged him as the sender of the ad-
versity which overpowered them. But when, as
the Hebrew bard would say, God ••epented of
the evil which he thought to do, men, in tHeir
prosperity, forget the salutary lessons of an uni-
form and ancient experience, forget how the
heart ,has always grown giddy and proud and
blasphemous with what ought to make it thank-
ful, and now, forsooth, in ^ongra^’ulating each
‘other on their prosperity, they pronounce them-
selves forturate; the advancement of knowledge,
the acknowledgement of popular rights, /or/a-
nate ; and the'settleipent at* Plymouth (the most
conspicuous kiterposition of God’s Providence
in these latter days) fortunate.' I mourn at the

1 That any thing happens by chanc<?,** said Bishop But-
ler, every thinl^g mA knows is absurd/* (R. W. E.)

47

1825] PRACTICAL POETRY

scepticisin of prosperity, the scepticism of know-
ledge^^he darkness of light. I love to trace the
unambiguous worl^mgs of a greater hand than
ours. Poetry had better drink at immortal foun-
tains. Eloquence is best inspired by an Infinite
cause. Jfis* always an agreeable j)icture to the
human imagination, the allusions to the strength
of seeming weakness. No eye was ever offended
at the tiny viblet peeping out in fresh bloom on
Qold autumnal days, when the leaves arp fallen
and the oak is bare. None are disgusted at the
fable of the bending willow which outlived the
storm tha* tore down the monarchs of the forest.
Yet such a power of meek sublimity is detected
all along the course of human events, (among
men, not of men), impelling and immortalizing
the salutary principles of nature.

PRACTICAL POETRY

January 23, 1825.

Poetry, wis^ women have saidf hath a^oble
inutility, and is loved, as the flowers»of the field)
because nbt the* necessaries, but the luxuries of
life ; yet I observe it has sometimes deigned to
mix in the most important influences that act
on society. The revolutionary spirit in this cold
and prudential country, it ss said., was kept alive

48 JOURNAL [Age 21

and energized in 1 776 by the seasonable aid of
patriotic songs and satirical ballads pointing at
we|l-lcnown names and acts.'Of Tyrtaeus and his
conquering elegies who has not heard? And
Greek history has another more extraordinary
instance to the„purpose. When Lycurgus medi-
tated the introduction into Sparta of his unpre-
cedented political model, he prevailed on Thales,
whom he met as he travelled in Asia Minor, to
pass to. Laconia and compose poems there of
such a character as to prepare the minds of his
countrymen for the novel schemes of the Re-
former.*

“keeping

He that searches analogies in arts and life will
discern something akin to what in painting is
called keepings in many corners where ’t is un-
looked for. For though mine ear is untdught
by nature or art in the mysteries of music, y^t I
havenfcund my guess that such performance was
good or bad, on more than one^occasion borne

I The most remarkable instance of tlje power of mere lit-
erature is Dean Swift, a modern Tyrtteus, who turned the tide
of political opinions in the Britisi!i nation, ruined Marlborough,
and denounced Wood’s half-pence by pamphlets. Nothing
fell from his pen in vain, says Johnson. Idolized by the Irish,
and proud of his inftvence.^ee Lives of the Poets. (R. W. E. )

1825] SOLITUDE 49

out by cpmpetent hearers when my only meahs
of forlijing a judgment was the observation that
there were abrupt fVansitions from loud to spft
sounds without the just degrees which might be
termed the keeping of music. A skilful^critic will^
readily ^ee fhe justice of the application of tltis
figure to any composition, also whether irt verse
or prose. (Though I admit the propriety of cer-
tain exceptiotft in all the applications of the rule;
as when in Haydn’s Creation^ an explosion of
sound announces the change from darkness to
light; or in Dryden’s Ode on Cecilia's Day,
violent transition of subject and manner is
permitted.)

SOLITUDE

Roxbury, January 29, 1825.

But when it pleased God, who separated from my
mothej' s womb, and called me by his grace, reveal his Son
in me, that I might preach him among the heathen ; immedi-
ately I conferred not with flesh and blood : neither went I up
to Jerusalem to them which were apostles Ijjfore m«"^but I
went into Arabia, Ml^d returned again unto Damascus.”]
^Gala^ans^ chap# i. 15, 16, 17.

. . . You will be told that it k wholly a fan-
ciful scheme, such as boys ^11 have in their turn
and all sound*mind*s outgrow — thus to talk of
divorcing yourself* from ^ciety and making

5© JOURNAL [Age 21

yourself a haughty alien from flesh and blood
and its vulgar concerns, in the conceit oft'giving
yqur life to books, prayersf^and barren medita-
tions, and when you have been taunted as a friar,
grave sophists will accost you and tell you, under
thfe sanction of great names, that man' is.born by
the side of his father, and therefore should re-
main a social being ; that it is deducible from
the laws of political economy that we should be
social, and many of the human faculties have no
use in solitude, which is the strong voice of na-
ture pronouncing you fool. They will tell you
that Newton and Bacon and Shakspeare were
nursed and bred in crowds. Nay, veteran reform-
ers may go a step or two beyond, and tell you in
a learned whisper that Religion has been mere
Reason of State ever since Numa’s time, and al-
ways will be: that, though men of sense and, spirit
,are seen in public worship, ’t is merely as t|jey
countenance the constables ; and that by no acci-
dent -clid any eye in earth or Heaven ever de-
fect them in private. So ’t were better you did
not set your judgment against the whole world’s,
and so ruin a^ promising youth by falling into
disesteem and opprobrium. Against this con-
senting witness, or more, against this lofty deri-
sion, what Stoic, can i^^tand ? You judge it best to

1825] SOLITUDE OF SOUL 51

leave the ground you took, and rather than bd
^persuadi^d twice, O son of the ill-advised Adam,
pluck the fruit that,iothers have plucked, and
rush into the great, foolish procession that goes
through the world drawing all men into jts train,
and nonf krtow whence they cojyie or where
they go. “ O for a warning voice which Hd that
saw the Apocalypse heard cry in heaven aloud.
Woe to the inhabitants of earth.” And you too
wijl enter, you who should have been prophet
and rescuer to a thousand of your brothers.
You will submit that hopeful character to these
depraved influences and be ground down to the
same base level. Meantime though you have
let it go, there is a good, solid and eternal, in
casting oflF the dishonest fetters of opinion and
nursing your solitary faculties into a self-exist-
ence so that your thoughts and actions shall be
in a degree your own. I commend no absurd
sacrifices. I praise no wolfish misanthropy that’
retrea'ts to thickets from cheerful <townS7^*and
scrapes the groufld for roots and acouis, either
out of a gjovellipg §oul,^of a hunger for glory
that has mistaken grimace for philosophy. It is
not the solitude of pla(?e, but the solitude of
soul which is so inestimable to us. . . .

52 JOURNAL [Age 21

. . . The Parnassian nag I rode, I perceive
has thrown me, and I have been bes^-iding a
hobby. It was my.design,r^nd must be the topic
of a true discussion of this nature, to commend
study, meditation, the preference of moral and
‘Intellectual things to appetites for outward things ;
and -as far as Solitude can be a generalization of
these things it may be admitted as the cardinal
topic. But in this light ’t were foolish to admit
Newton, Bacon and Shalcspeare as counter inr
stances, or at all as exceptions. F or all that made
them great, is my very argument, the very stuff
I praise, and all that subtracted from their re-
spective worth is the very object of nty invec-
tive sarcasm, admonition, rebuke, irony, satire,
derision, assault, — O ye words ! I have no
breath to utter ’em. The philanthropist will per-
chance throw in the teeth of the anchorite the
verse of Milton: —

“ The Mind is it’s own place, and in itself

■’ Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven —
Wha: matter where, if I be still the same ? ”

I only propose to"let that mind be" unswaddled,
unchained, aAd there is no danger of any excess
in the practice of this doctrine.

“ So forcible within our hearts we feel
The boifd of nature draw us to our own.”

HENRY CLAY

1825]

53

Nature vindicates her rights, and society is nior6
delicidit^ to the occasional absentee. Besides,
though I recommend the wilderness, I only en-
force the doctrine of stated or frequent and ha-
bitual closetings. Men may be read, a^ well as
books, tpd much. ...

HENRY CLAY

February 6.

,And if Henry Clay is dead, another great
spirit has gone, like Byron’s, over the unvoy-
ageable gulf, another contemner of moral dis-
tinctions, t» the award of the Divinity who set
those distinctions, and not the less created the
genius which defied them. Man feels a property
in the eloquence, as in the poetry, of his fellows,
or rather owes allegiance to those who exercise
lordsjjip over his noblest and dearest capacities,
ant^ so the 4 )ublic, loss is mourned as when a
sovereign dies. But it is a paradox that is a^ain
and again forced on our wonder, hcjv thdSe-who
act a part so important in its influences on the.
world shotrid be permitted to give their genius
to the worst passions, to cast the children’s bread
before the dogs. That\ncient doctrine that a
human soul is but a larger or less emanation
from the Infinite soul is so ^ree^ble to our im-

54 JOURNAL [Age 21

agination that something like this has always
been a cherished part of popular beli'^f. . . .
IVJan is but the poor orgah through which the
breath of Him is blown; a pipe on which stops
^are sounded of strange music. A torch not
lighted for itself. Yet these, such is“the mystery
of Free Will, turn on the hand that feeds them,
dishonour the energy that inspires them, blas-
pheme the spirit that in them blasphemes. By-
ron, who partook richest of Divinity, foully ridi-
cules the virtues practised to obey Him. Clay
scorns the laws which bind all God’s creatures.

February 8.

He is not dead. The story of the duel was
false. Alas ! for mine ejaculations.

REFLECTIONS

Roxburv, 1825.

If is the evening of February eighth, which
was never renowned that I know. But, be that
• as it may, ’t is the last evening*^! spend in Can-
terbury. I go to my- College Chamber to-mor-
row a little changed for better or worse since I
left it in 1 821. I have learned a few more names
and dates, additional facility of expression, the
gauge of my own ignorance, its sounding-places

i8a5l PERSONAL 55

and bottpmless depths. I have inverted my irt-
quiriei^two or three times on myself, and have
learned what a ginnffc' and a saint I am. My car-
dinal vice of intellectual dissipation — sinful
strolling from book to book, from caret^ idleness^
— is my cardinal vice still ;^is a n^jalady that be-
longs to the chapter of Incurables. I have \9ritten
two or three hundred pages that will be of use to
me.- 1 have eaft-ned two or three thousand dollars
vrhich have paid my debts and obligated my
neighbors, so that I thank Heaven I can say
none of my house is the worse for me. In short,
I have grown older and have seen something of
the vahity and something of the value of exist-
ence, have seen what shallow things men are, and
how independent of external circumstances may
be the states of mind called good and ili.*

I Efhcrson was very glad to close his schoo- and turn scholar
agai^. He had •consideied joining William in Germany, bu^
was deterred by the unknown language and the expense.^ The
family circumstances were easier, however, 4 Lfrtltlf^ard had
graduated in 1824 aiSl was earning. Charles, wly) had just en-,
tcred college,^alone remained t(f be educat!%d. So Waldo de-
cided to enter the Divinity School irp Cambridge, as he wrote
to William that *‘the learned reverenef have consented to
admit me to the middle class,’* He took a room on the lower
floor of Divinity Hall (No. 14), which soon proved very
unwholesome.

56 JOURNAL [Age a I

[Here follows in the journal an account of
Mr. Emerson’s call, in company with his jrfother
Edward, on John Adams^^the venerable ex-
president. It is omitted here, because Mr. Em-
^erson prjnted it in full at the end of his essay
“ Old Age ” in Society and Solitude.^

r *

Cambridge, February, 1825.

I have a mind to try if my m,use hath ,not
lost a whit of her nimbleness; if the damps of
this new region, its prescribed and- formal study,
have n’t chilled a little her prurient and prolific
heat. I would boldly take down a topic and en-
ter the lists, were there not reason to remember
and fear the old Orthodoxy concerning Fortune
(and I think I have heard it whispered of fairies
too and of wit even), that, when the humour-
some, jealous coquette is presumed on, she with-
draweth straight her smiles, and leaves thb au-
dacious votary to curse his self-conceit in 'che
dark.7 u..

I insert here that there seems to be a fine
moral in the passa^f of the , ancient historian
who says the Lacedemonians were in the habit
of rising up very eftrly to pray, that so they
might be beforehand of their enemies and pre-
occupy the ear of gods.*

■ »»S] QUPTATIONS 57

But ^ sit idle on the household hearth
A ^urdenous drone ; to visitants a gaze
Or pitied object.^i

Samson Agonistes,

Short is {he date of all immoderate fan4b.

It Icmks as heav’n our ruin had designed
And durst not trust thy fortune and thy mind.”

Absalom and Achitophel.

“ Dim as the borrowed beam of moon and.stars
To lonely, weary, wandering travellers
Is reason to the soul ; and as on high
Those foiling fires discover but the sky.

Not light us here ; so reason’s glimmering ray
Was lent, not to assure our doubtful way.

But guide us upward to a better day ;

And as,” etc.

Religto*Laici,

BIBLE

* This only doctrine does our lusts oppose
Unfed by nature’s soil, in which

Religio Laid.

“ Scripture wa? scarce and, a? the market* went.

Poor laymen took salvat\pn on content.

As needy men take money, good or bad ;

God’s word tMfey had not, but the priest’s they had.”

► Religio Laid.

58 JOURNAL [Age zi

As much as you men of the world,aclcnow-
ledge good and noble is all derived from r/?<igion,
from the principles of natuve to which I appeal,
as your honour, etc.

Vthe ministry of the ixvyI

What have we to say worth the attention of
men, when we put on, in these latter days, the
profession of the sacred teacher? We remember
with pcide and gratitude the venerable men who, ■
in all past time, have instructed humanity, from
those Oriental sages who gave the first direction
to the understanding, down to the accomplished
orators whose accents yet ring in the ear of this
generation. And have they left anything un-
said? Is this a science of discoveries? What
contribution in your hand, what hope have you
in heart? Theology, which in pagan lanijs was
only one part of Ethics, the r,evolutoon of events
has,enriched with noble parts. Theology, since
ReVfelaticiuV lias become the great science of man,
•the only object here known worth the sole en-
gagement, of the intellect. * Ethics is a second-
ary — a branch of this first philosophy. A cor-
respondent change effects its professors. To bd
the curious speculators on the contradictory
phenomena of thqiight, td be the humble ad-

1825] THE MINISTRY 59

visers to courses of conduct least dark, where all
was doubtful, — this was the ambition, this the
merit of the heatheji sages. The ordinations of
the Divinity respecting this world have put that
office on different foundations. Those men who
assume the charge of directing the flevotion#
and duties of sotiety are *now the immediate
representatives of the Deity, the organs through
which he speaks to his creatures ; the vicars, as
the ambitious have said with a profane secular
import, of Go*d. Ah ! what ? Has Nature broke
her marble silence ? Has the spell of weary cen-
turies dissplved and the Deity disclosed himself
to men ? Has the Most High opened his sublime
abodes and come down on his sorrowing chil-
dren with healing in his wings? Speak! How
came he? What is he? What said he ? and what
is to come? Here we sat in the world waiting;
admiring wjiat could be the design of the ap-
pmntments we seemed to be fulfilling, enduring
as we could the pangs we met, but

embracing evilVith heavy hearts, sicjcening and
alway dying, to the* eve’of our ^ort day which
went down in darkness, arfd e^ecially moved
with a sad curiosity anti foreboding as to what
should befall, us after death. We saw in the
world that some Mind had^^rou^ht, or now per-

6 o JOURNAL [Aob 21

4

chance consummated its active will with inex-
pressible might, and we waited when a^last he ‘
should break out into audiUe declaration of him-
seKf to our ears. But in vain we waited, who died
before the sight. Say what he hath said. This is
'the language the eager stoic should* utter to us
when ‘restored to consciousness.

SOLITUDE OR SOCIETY {coi\tinued)

There can be no doubt that, in the disposi-
tion of human affairs which F^rovidence has
made, there are great natural advantages pro-
per to the social state. But it is equally con-
formable to divine dispensations that these
should be blended and balanced by disadvan-
ts^es. It is the part of wisdom, therefore, to
choose ^that safe middle path which shall avail
itself of the good and escape as much of the
evil as is possible. ...

No man can examine the connexions and de-
pend!?!*^'^” .?f men in society without being struck
with the harmony and value of die whole design.
That infinity df relationships which spring from
parentage, 'fronj mafnage, is a singular advantage
of the present order df things. If the world
should be conceived to be peopled in any other
mode, the innumerable connexions that tie soci-

I8*5] the social duty 6i

ety together being taken away, would take off a
mightjf check from the bad passions.

It is pleasant: tqisee in society two strangers
introduced. True to the social principles of na-
ture, they begin to feel round on the ordinary
topics of conversation, until they ^nd where they
can nearest meet and sympathize. And )^u can
hardly make two countrymen acquainted who
will not frequently find some name with which
both are connected by nature, affectioq or ac-
quaintance; so far do the roots of families extend.

It is an ignoble and ungrateful part, in a man
who righUy considers the goods of existence,
to submit to be only born to this heritage, to be
a passive recipient of life, or to lay a light and
sloven hand on the generous bequests of Nature
and Providence. It manifests a noble spirit, in
harmony with the liberal giver, to come eagerly
into the enjpyment to which we are invited, in-
stead of skulking to a mouthful in the dark. We
would not be the parasites of G#dfe^bunty,
hungry for the*good, but too mean ,and selfish
to be capable of gratitude.^ We would rather be
forgiven for’ a noble daring, for*an ambition to
see all, to know all, to*usc all. We would fain
try the virtue»of th^se powers, we would grapple
with what is great,* we wotiUd fqjlow what flies,

62 JOURNAL [Age 21

take hold on truth and imprison pleasure. We
would go boldly on our adventurous qu95t and
risk something to acquire a^ght on the nature,
extent and end of our condition. In short, we
would feel that it is action which exalts our na-
ture above the slothful clod.

There is reason in Action. ' The good that is
borne to us is not sharpened by our sluggishness.
There is no indication in the fearfirl whirl of the
rolling ‘Universe that we should squat down
unprofitable quietists in its lap.’ Besides the
strong presumption there is, that by pushing
these energies to their utmost we may even de-
serve something, may earn merits instead of be-
ing a charge on the Universe.

[riches ']

Hae ye seen the caterpillar

Foully warking in his nejt ?

*T is the puir man getting siller ;

cleanness, without rest.

* I Mr. EmeVson fopied thesf verses into his “ Verse book,”
in a slightly modified forni, <vhich would show that, in spite
of their Scottish dress, they were his own, and, as such, they
arc included in the Centenary* Edition of the Poems (page
374 )*

,8251 LETTER TO HIS AUNT 63

Hae ye seen the butterfly
In braw claithing drest ?

’T is thc^ puii^man gotten rich
With rings and painted vest.

Th^ puir man crawls in web of rags
•And sair beset with v»oes,

But when he flees on riches’ wings
He laugheth at his foes.

R.,W. E. TO MISS EMERSON
(From “XVIII,” 2d)

Marchy 1825.

Anthropomorphism is, or has been, a bug-
bear of a word, and yet it wraps up in its long
syllables a sound and noble doctrine. So simple
is the deduction of Reason, or so inevi^ble the
inborn propensity to believe in God, that the
Sadducee ig solitary in his cheerless creed. In
the excess, as it seems to me, of the same faith,
we find human faces in the cloudsfdwrir* human
voices in the roaring of the storms, and shake
at spectres that surrouh^ us in*the dark. The
frivolous mythologies that are heard of in his-
tory pass and repass fn the eyes of men, but
take a firm r«ot ndwhere. Religion, like meta-
physics or physics,* hath it! striyg of old wives’

64 JOURNAL [Age 21

tales, told to its dishonour in every country ; one
tissue in Assyria, another at Memphis, Another
in. Gaul, another by the ^‘altic, but probably
there was no single spot and no one moment
.when legitimate notions of the First Cause did
not find place along with this contemporary
nonsense. For the sober divinity of common
sense is no aristocrat. He dwells in high and
humble places, he is no recent revelation, but is
of Greek and Babylonian, nay, of antediluviasi
antiquity. And the grounds of proof are not
more new. The eye, proverbially called the
cure for Atheism; the hand, a machine of as
exquisite and undeniable design ; the mind, that
busy deducer of causes from effects, itself the
strongest and most evasive of all phenomena ;
the great globe itself and all mighty connexion
that bind together its vast innumerable species
— all these things subsisted in theit*entire fo^ce,
bare^all their testimony to the mind of Adam, as
to mine.^"t .

The life* of a man is the epitome of the life
of a body, of men., “A single house* will show
whatever is dorfe or suffe^red in the world,” [said]
Juvenal. The effect’s of circumstances on the
individual are wonderfully analogoVis to the same
effects on a state. A^d those final causes, whose

LETTER

1825]

65

harmony.strikes the eye with more grandeur oh
the vaster theatre, are as conspicuous and as
conclusive evidence' to the wisdom which ar-
ranged them in the individual as in the nation.
Yet the foolish folk of the ancient tim^ are re-
presented,’ v^ith the solitary^ exception of here
and there an Aristotle or two, as bowing Mown
to an ox, to an onion, to a block, and devoutly
believing in the divinity of the poor baggages.

■ Now I put the question, whether in thelcourse
of your life (which, pardon me, I do not mean
is long) you have not known at least half a
dozen persons who, without being Aristotles,
have yet had dogged sense enow to have dis-
believed, to have scouted all that mythological
flummery as soon as they came to years of dis-
cretion ? And if so be that you have known six
or seyen, and each other explorer of mankind
six or seven^ore,^why, we shall very soon be
able to acquit our pagan forefathers of being such
absolute bears as the learned, in their'kiflipoons,
will have them to be. There is no doubt some-
thing very^mposingln an jncient establishment
that has intertwined its roots with government,
property, art and poetry^ but there is something
also revolting in the'gross superstition to correct
the seduction ; and* moreover tlyere are scenes

66 JOURNAL [Ace 21

and hours of redemption Nature hath provided
for her children (or some of her childrer>), when
she sends down upon thi^m (the night in its
beauty, and takes off the veil of garish day from
the glowing, adorning firmament. These sights
stir the strong principles afresh in the soul ; and
I do*not think it *s in the’ Understanding of
man, when he stands in that temple, to ascribe
the whole matter to a cat or crocodile, or yet to a
sorry ‘society, like the Olympian banditti. la
fine, I do not so disparage Reason, God’s elder
Revelation, as to think *t would leave men en-
tirely in the lurch in their greatest coyicernment;
nor swallow such fables as to admit the firmness
with which I see society amid all her institutions
stood, without ascribing to men’s conscience the
same wholesome and sublime authority it ex-
erts now.

[later COMlvftNTsJ

6uPH>:.^«,author should remember that there
are some things so absolutely flnpossible as not
to be found *by the biosC curious And micro-
scopic eye, “fijr what never was will not easily
be found, not even by the most curious.” Pub-
lic prosperity was content in old times in old
nations with very gradual advances. She made

,825] THE EDUCATED MIND 67

many pauses and some retrocessions, but lat-
terly she has mended her pace and has called
in art to her aid ;• sh^ travels the land in rail-
roads and steam coaches ; she sweeps the sea
with a pressure of a thousand pounds, and all
sails spread ; ^nd sends her paracl^ute through
the air like a cloud. ‘There are some men whose
minds misgive them, when they see the pro-
digious rate af which they are borne in the
.public vessel. They cannot help but be giddy
and out of brealih at the accelerated velocity of
their motion. A Sabbath day’s journey would
be a safer jqg.

[the educated mind]

Choose a sensible man to a responsibly place
rather jchan a man versed in the particular art
which is to by taught, inasmuch as a method of
acquVing truth is better than the truth it has
already ascertained. Let your discipliwJ^eral-
ize the mind ofV boy rather than teach him
sciences, that he ma^ ha^e mean’s, more than
results.

The Indian will give his* bow for the knife
with which it was made.

68

JOURNAL

[Acs 21

Books to Read

Philippe de Comfeinek;

Machiavel ;

Cardinal de Retz;

Mofitaigne’s Essays;

Plato’s Dialogues;

Isocrates’ Panegyric;

Constitution of the United States;

Adam Smith, Works,

[The last two entries, following the letter to
Miss Emerson, are written in a large, straggling
hand, the writer evidently not looking on his
page. There are no more journal entries in 1 825.
Emerson’s family letters of this time showed that
his hfalth failed rapidly after he moved to Di-
vinity Hall. His eyes gave out completely, and
he had a “stricture of the chesj,” and a very
lame hip. He was obliged to give up his studies
and visit his Uncle Ladd, who lived in

Newton. He staid there unth summer, helping
as he could oh the farhi,artd his health improved.
Madam Emerson had taken a house on North
Avenue (near Jarvis Field) to be near her sons,
for Edward was teaching and .studying law in
Daniel Webgter’s>office, and Charles in College.

i8zs] SCHOOLMASTER AGAIN 69

Waldo took some private pupils during thfe
' summer, and taught a school in Chelmsford
in the autumtx ^•me recollections of their
schoolmaster by pupils at Chelmsford are given
in Emerson in Concord, p. 32.]

JOURNAL XVII

(From “XV,” “XVI,” “XVIII,” 2d, and Cabot’s
Q and R)

[Somewhat improved in health, Emerson came
to Roxbury at the'beginning of the year to take,
for a time, a school which Edward’s health had
obliged him to give up. He taught there during
the winter, and in April rejoined his mother in
Cambridge, in the “ Mellen House ” on North
Avenue, which afforded a schoolroom. There
he gathered his last school, which he taught until
the end of the summer. Among his scholars were
Richard Henry Dana and John Holmes. (See
Mors^e’s life of Richard Henry Dana, page 5,
and Holmes’s life of Emerson, page 50,)]

(From “XV”)

"January 8, 1826.

I come with mended eyes td my ancient friend
and consoler: Has the interval of silence made
the writer wi^r? Does his mind teem with well
weighed judgments.? *The moral and intellect-
ual universe has not halted beqause the eye of
the observer was closed. Compensation has been

,826] 9 ^EER REVIVING 71

woven to want, loss to gain, good to evil, and
good to good, with the same industry, and the
same concealment an intelligent cause. And
in my joy to write and read again I will not pes-
ter my imagination with what is done unseen,
with the^bufden that is put in the contrary scale,'
with the sowing oF the death-seed in the place
of the nettle that was rooted up. I am a more
cheerful phildSopher, and am rather anxious to
tljank Oromasdes than to fear Ahriman.'

Since I wrote before, I know something more
of the grounds of hope and fear of what is to
come. But if my knowledge is greater, so is my
courage. I know that I know next to nothing,
but I know too that the amount of probabilities
is vast, both in mind and in morals. It is not
certain that God exists, but that he doe^ not is
a moft bewildering and improbable chimaera.

I rejoice 4|hat I jive when the world is so old.
Xffere is the same difference between living with
Ada'm and living with me as in goiijgi«<to a*new
house unfinishea, damp and empty, and going
into a long occupied hofise whefe the time and
taste of its inhabitants has accuqjulated a thou-
sand useful contrivance?, has furnished the cham-
bers, stocked*the cellars, and filled the library.
In the new house every earner must do all for

7flt JOURN,^L [Act 22

himself. In the old mansion there are butlers,
cooks, grooms and valets. In the new house all
must work, and work with c.,he hands. In the old
one there are poets who sing, actors who play and
ladies who dress and smile. O ye lovers of the
past, judge between my houses. I Would not be
elsew*iiere than I am.

COMPENSATION

All things are double one against another, sud^
Solomon. The whole of what we'‘know is a sys-
tem of compensations. Every defect in one man-
ner is made up in another. Every fiuffering is
rewarded ; every sacrifice is made up ; every debt
is paid.

The history of retributions is a strange and
awfiil story ; it will confirm the faith that wavers,
and, more than any other moral feature, is per-
haps susceptible of examination /ind analysis,
and, more than any other, fit to establish the
doctrinuii 0 £.Divine Providence. . . .

I have seen — all men in "the common cir-
cumstances of society may See — the thrift, cold-
blooded and hard-hearted thrift, that has wrought
out for itself its own ffeward, men and women
that set out to be rich, that sold their body,
its strength, it,s grade, its health, its sleep ; yea.

1826 ] COMPENSATION 73

and sold fheir soul, its peace, its affections, its
^ime, its education, its religion, its eternity, for
gold. They havepaid the price and by the laws
of Providence they shall receive their purchase.
But by the laws of Providence they shal^receive
nothing morb. They have not bought any im-
munity from bodily pain, any grace froni the
elements, any courtesy from the diseases ; they
made no mention with their dealers of gentle
affections, and asked no more of the Intellect-
ual Principle than how to cast their drivelling
balances of loss and gain. Health, knowledge,
friendship, God, — these were no parties to their
contract, no guarantees against disaster. These
were defrauded of the just debt which each
human being owes them, to scrape together the
means by which wealth was to be bought But
these are creditors that will not let them pass
unchallenged.^ They have asked no protection
agaifist the evils of life, and God has left them
naked to them. . . .

Ignorance shalfcurse them with a leaden cloud
on their understandirfgs, tligir hours shall drag
by in stupid darkness, unvisited by Thought,
the daughter of God, denounced, forgot, unre-
cognized by thagreafbrotherhood of intelligent
minds who are penetrating iftto tl[)e obscure on

74 JOURNAL [Age 22

every side and adding new provinces to the king-
dom of Knowledge. . . .

But all who sell themselves do not sell for
wealth. There are many dupes of many passions.
Nor are the compensations that God ordains
confined to single class of moral agents. To
come nearer to my design, I will venture to as-
sert that whilst all moral reasonings of necessity
refer to a whole existence, to a vaster system of
things than is here disclosed, there are, never-
theless, strong presumptions here exhibited that
perfect compensations do hold, that very much
is done in this world to adjust the uneven bal-
ance of condition and character.

There are certain great and obvious illustra-
tions of this doctrine which lie on the outside of
life and have therefore been always noted : that
prodigality makes haste to want; that riot intro-
duces disease ; that fearful crjmes ?ire hunted by
fearful remorse ; that the love of money is pun-
ished by the care of money ; that honest indi-
gence is cheerful ; that in fertile climates the air
breathes pestilence, and in healthy .t-ones there
is an iron soil ; that whilst the mind is in igno-
rant infancy, the body is supple and strong;
when the mind is informed and powerful the
body decays, -r- these and all this most important

i8z6] COMPENSATION 75

class of fvts lie at the foundation of our faith*
^n God’s being and providence. . . .

I say that sin iS igA)rance, that the thief steals
from himself; that he who practices fraud is
himself the dupe of the fraud he practi<;ps, that
whoso borrows runs in his own debt; and whoso

• ^ * f

gives to another benefits himself to the same
amount.

Our nature Itas a twofold aspect, towards self
and towards society ; and the good or evil, the
riches or poverty of a man, is to be measured,
of course, by its relation to these two.

And in riie view of individual, unconnected
character, as a moral being having duties to fulfil
and a character to earn in the sight of God, am
I impoverished that I have given my goods to
feed the poor, that I have hazarded half my
estate in the hands of my friend in yielding to
calls of morak sentijnent which made a part of
my highest nature ? Am I the richer in my own
just estimation tjiat I have unjustly taken or
withheld from my fellow man his good name,
his rights. Of his property?* Am 1 tlie ripher that
I have tied up my own purse and 4jorrowed for
my needs of the treasure* oP my friends? Shall
I count myself riche’r that I have received an
hundred favours and rendered npne? Myself

76 JOURN.AL4 [Age 22

- — the man within the breast — anx the sole
judge of this question and there is no appeal
from the decisive negativU* The daily mistake
of thousands and tens of thousands who jump
to make any pitiful advantage of their neighbour
must not be^ quoted against this tribunal. . . .
It is not the true estimate of a man’s actual
value that is made from the balance of figures
that stands in his favour on his ledger. This is to
be corrected from the book of Life within him.
... If it is the reward of honest industry and
skill, to which, said the ancient philosopher, the
gods have sold all things, his estimate is correct,
his doings are respected in heaven and in earth.
Each man knows . . . what is his just standing,
whether he is indebted or whether he has ren-
dered others rich and happy.

We have, we trust, made it apparent, that in
the aspect of self, our doctrine that nothing in
the intercourse of men can be given, is sound.
The doctrine is no less true, no less important
in its respect to our social nature. If a man
steals, is it not known ? If he borrows, is it not
known? If hi receives gifts, is it not known? If
I accept importanf benefits from another, in
secret or in public, there arises "of course from
the deed a secret ''acknowledgment of benefit

,826] letter, TO HIS AUNT 77

on his pjrt and of debt on mine, or, in othe'r
' words, of superiority and of inferiority.

(from Cabot’s Q)

LETTER TO MISS EMERSON

"January, *1 826.

The name of Hume, I fancy, has hardly^gath-
ered all its fame. His Essays are now found all
over Europe 5 nd will take place doubtless in all
• P^rrhonian bosoms of all other freethinkers of
England or France. German theology will prop
itself on him, and suggest to its lovers a sort of
apology and consolation in his mild and plausi-
ble epicureanism. He is one of those great limi-
tary angels to whom power is given for a season
over the minds and history of men, not so much
to mislead as to cast another weight iuto the
contrary scale in that vast and complex adjust-
ment of good and evil to which our understand-
ings are accommodated and through whicH
they" are to escape by the fine clue of moral
perception. For me, I hold fast to my old faith,,
that to eaeh soul is *a solitary law* a several uni-
verse. The colours to our eyes may be differ-
ent, your red may be m*y green. My innocence,
to one of more oppbrtunity, shall be guilt. To
one age, in like manner, CJhristyinity is a stern

78 JOURNAL [Age 2z

dogmatical and ritual religion, but it answers
their prayers and does also fulfil its Divine pur-
poses. To the next generation 'it is a gentle and
intellectual faith, for its disciples are men of
minds and manners, and it likewise doth God’s
will to them New England is now the most
reading community in the world, and, of course,
has the love of knowledge, and lust of change.
In the supposed case of the external evidences
being shaken down of Christianity, will there be
any hope beyond the experiment of the morals
of Seneca and Antonine on an improved age ?
Shall we not be safer for Butler’s “..Analogy”?
Suppose we could lose our hold on the founda-
tions of Christianity, would there be nothing
satisfying in esteeming it also a great permitted
engine of most exact and benign adaptation to
the wants of many past ages, and so, yielding to
an offensive aphorism, that what, is absolutely
false may be relatively true ? Judgment must be
measured to a man of Bagdad on a compound
regard to the law of Conscience and the law of
Mahomet, if the secrets of external nature were
disclosed, the^'e were no science to' discipline our
minds. If every candleVere a sun, we should be
blind. If every doubt were’solved, we should be
listless clods.. Presently the door will be un-

1826] \|^RSES 79

bolted at .which we daily knock, and some of us
shudder.

* [ci^EATNESs]

It is doleful consolation to those who aspire
in vain, to see how imperfect is greaAess ; —
Buonapafrte finding his greatest felicity in* bed,
in a bed; Byron attributing his poetic inspiration
to gin ; Charles XII dozing and boasting away
an insignificant manhood in the provinces of
T\irkey. Richard III is respectable wKen he
says,

“ Slave, •! have set my life upon a cast,

And I will stand the hazard of the die ! ”

Whoso, alas ! is young,

And being young is wise

And deaf to saws of gray Advice,

Hath listened when the Mu^.’s sung
An^ heard with joy when on the wind the shell o^
Clio rung.'

1 The last two lines, in different form, occur among later
poetical fragments, apropos of tha greater charms History had
for the youth than Metaphysics : —

Slighted Minerva*s4eari)|ed tongue,

But leaped for joy when on the wind
The shell of Clio rung.

8o

JOURNAL

[Age 22

THE SABBATH

. . . The Sabbath is a respite from the impor-
tqnacy of passion, from the dangerous empire of
human anxieties ; a pious armistice in the warfare
of the world, a point of elevation like the Pisgah
of tl]e man 6f God, an observatory whence we
measure backward the wilderness we have trav-
ersed, and forward the interval that is yet to be
trodden by us ere the solemn shadows descend
upon 'our path, beyond which the magnificence
of other worlds is towering into the distance.

SLAVE TRADE

To stop the slave traffic the nations should
league themselves in indissoluble bands, should
link the thunderbolts of national power to de-
molish this debtor to all Justice human and di-
vine.

VERSES *.

Ah Fate ! Cannot a man
Be wise without a beard ? •

From efist to we,st, from Beersheba to Dan,
Prr.y was it neter heard

1 These verses, amended, in several lines by the Author,
but never published by him, appear, with an additional stanza,
in the Appendix to the Poems, in the Rit^erside and Centeo'-
ary Editions.

, 826 ] THE REAL RULERS 8i

That, wisdom might in youth be gotten,

Or wit be ripe before *t was rotten ?

He pays too high a price
For knowledge and for fame
WJjo sells his sinews to be wise,

•His teeth and bones tX) buy a name.

And crawls half-dead, a paralytic.

To earn the praise of bard and critick.

Is it not better done

To dine and sleep through forty years,

Be loved by few, be feared by none,

Ljugh life away, have wine for tears,

And take the mortal leap undaunted.

Content that all we asked was granted ?

But Fate will not permit
The seed of gods to die.

Nor suffer Sense to win fron^ Wit
Its gwerdoii in the sky.

Nor let us hide, whatever our pleasure,

The World’s^light underneath a measure.

[•RUL^s]

. . . Who are the real sovereigns of Britain
and France? Notsurely tfieSimplegentlementhat
are kept in the palaces and produced on state
occasions with gaudy frocks *and Ijaubles on their

82 JOURNAL [Ace EE

heads, or in their hands, and saluted, with the
smooth old title of King. Surely these are not
they who act most powerfully ‘on the fortunes
and the minds of the British and the French.
But ScQtt and Mackintosh and Jeffrey and La-
place, these ace the .true de facto sovereigns, who
rule in those countries. They never affect the
airs, nor assume the trappings of vulgar majesty,
but they receive the secret and open homage of
all classes, they command feelings, determina-
tions and actions.

Pulchrum est laudari a laudato viro. Newton
said of Cotes, “ If he had lived, we siiould have
known something.”

FITNESS

I am pleased with every token, however slight,
in nature, in institutions, in arts, of progressive
^adaptation to wants. The i;nen of Switzerland
coyer their houses with shingles of the larch
tree, which in a little time giye out their pitch
to the sun and fill up e very joint so that the roof
is impervious to rain.

[thS* wind]

The Wind, who is the great potet of the world,
sings softer measures on summer eves in groves

18*6] LEiTTEI^ TO HIS AUNT 83

and garc^ens, and hoarser and sublimer music in
mountains and on the desolate sea.'

R. W. £. TO MISS EMERSON

Madam,

You have received the Jboding letter I writ
from Cambridge concerning German faith. I am
anxious to have sight enow to study theology in
this regard. The objections the German scholars
have proposed attack the foundations of external
evidence, and so give up the internal to histori-
cal speculators and pleasant doubters. The eager
appetite for novelty that rages among us un-
dieted, uncloyed by religious establishments and
venerable abuses, will not stand on ceremony
with any name or form or fact, by whatsoever
men or prejudices hallowed, when its genuineness
is denied. There will be to good men hencefor-
ward a hor^d at\,ticipation when the majestic
vision that has, for ages, kept a commanding
check upon the dangerous passions of men — has
rivetted the social bonds and brought forward sa
many noble spirits and prodigious benefits to the

I For Mr. Emerson’s delight in the sdfcg of the wind see,
in the Poems, the “ Wood Notes *fl,” where it sings through
the pine; also ^The fiarp” and “Maiden Song of the
iEoIian Harp.”

84 JOURN^lL [Age 22

help of struggling humanity — shall toll away,
and let in the ghastly reality of things. Regard
it as a possible event, and is the prospect of
a dark and disastrous tragedy. These great
Eleusinjpn Mysteries which have hoarded com-
fort from age,to age for human sufferings, — the
august Founder, the twelve self-denying heroes
of a pious renown, distancing in moral sublimity
all those primeval benefactors \Vhom ancient
gratitude deified; the apostles, whose desiring
eyes saw little lustre on earth, and no consolation
but in extending the victories, the moral vic-
tories of the Cross; the martyrs, who<had found
after so many sensual ages, in a faith for things
unseen, in a moral intellection, more than a com-
pensation for the lust of the world, and the pride
of life;tand after all these, and better even than
all these, the boundless aggregate of heartg and
deeds which the genius of Christi^ity touched
and inspired; the violence of fiery dispositions
to which it has whispered peac^,; the antidote it
.has administered to remorse and despair; the
Samaritan oil it has pQuVed into wounded hearts ;
the costly sacrifices and unpurchaseable devotion
to the cause of God ahd man it has now for
eighteen centuries inspired-^ all these must now
pass away and^becolne ridiculous. They have

,8*6] ( 1 ERM 4 .N SCEPTICS 85

been the^sum of what was most precious oh
earth. They must now pass into the rhetoric of
scoffer and atheist a^*the significant testimonies
of human folly, and every drunkard in his cups,
and every voluptuary in his brothel will^roll out
his tongue it the Resurrection from the dead ;
at the acts, the martyrdoms, the unassailable
virtues and the legendary greatness of Chris-
tianity. God forbid. It were base treason in his
.servants tamely to surrender his causey. The
gates of hell will not prevail against it. But it
were vile and supine to sit and be astonished
without exploring the strength of the enemy. If
heaven gives me sight, I will dedicate it to this
cause.

Patriots turn pale when some paper privilege,
some national punctilio, is withheld or disputed
to their country, and Christians should not sit
still when the honour of their Order (no tran-
sierffc ‘institution of one age or one realm, but
the Chivalry of^the Universe) is trampledTin
the dust. For the love of truth and good send
me your son timents bn tlii^ subject. .^. .

[reason;]

To the times preceding Christianity, Mind
and its works was a luxury ;^to the times subse-

86 JOURN 4 L [Acb 2*

quent, it has been a solemn instrumen|: of truth
and goodness.

'March 27, 1826.

My years are passing away. Infirmities are
‘ already Stealing on me that may be the deadly
enenv'es that are to dissolve me to dirt, and little
is yet done to establish my consideration among
my contemporaries, and less to get a memory
when I. am gone. I confess the foolish ambition
to be Valued, with qualification. I do not wafit
to be known by them that know me not, but
where my name is mentioned I would have it

' ^ I! ^

respected. My recollections of early life are not
very pleasant. I find or imagine in it a mean-
ness, a character of unfounded pride cleaving
to certain passages, which might come to many
ears that death has not yet shut. I would have
the echoes of a good name come to the 'same
cars to remove such imputation. .'

BYRON

Lord Byron calls Circumstance, that unspirit-
ual god and rqiscreator; and what thing is there
in the world he has not'marred or misplaced by
his unwise agency?

1826] ClIlVALJlY — HISTORY 87

AGE OF CHIVALRY

[After spealung.Vf its glamour, and its dark
side.] I can faintly hear some tremendous tones
in the clang of the Conqueror’s Curfew as it is
borne to my ear over the distance of centuries,*
and I ahi glad to be relieved by any iitiages,
however imperfect, of valour and virtue of the
same times, s« that I own I love the flourish of
the silver trumpet of Chivalry, for it speaks to
me of prevented oppression and vindicated in-
nocence in a forlorn and benighted time. But
all I wish {o say is an opinion I am proud to owe
to my youngest brother, and not to Bacon. It
runs somewhat in this wise: — Let the fictions
of Chivalry alone. Fictions, whether of the
theorist or poet, have their value as ornaments ;
but when they intrude into the place of facts,
they do infinite injury, inasmuch as it is only by
th€ perception an*d comparison of Truth thsft
we oan perceive and enjoy the harmonies oi^the
system of human destinies which the Deity is
accompli^ing from* age "to age.

[the world our ffE^CHER : history]

I have heard of* monks who had grown so
silly and deficient under their ^Rule that they

88 JOURNAL [Age 22

shut their eyes, — the lean, cowled coxcombs —
shut their eyes, when their mothers and sisters'
came to see them. We to6.‘.shaII be monks of a
mbre renowned canon of Folly, of Dulness, if
we can without shame take station at our grated
window, whiqh commands a prospect of the uni-
verse’ and the great unmarsha'lled crowd of all its
agents, and shut our eyes upon the eminent and
the amiable, on what might pldase and what
might warn us.

Why else this complex machinery, these de-
pendent agencies of mind and matter, conspiring
to bring about the useful effect, — to teach us
something of other men, — running backward to
the beginnings of our race ? Why the active cu-
riosity which in us corresponds to these contri-
vances.out of us for intelligence? Why, but that
it behoved us to know what had been donp, that
we might acknowledge and exercjse the moral
affinities which time and space do not affect, ^nat
we*might sympathizewith the eldest and feel that
we set an example to the latest man. This is the
only unity, the only accord into which^the diver-
sities of hun^n condition can be blended. In
the error and the reotitfide, in the agreeable and
distressing events, in the education and degen-
eracy of so many rfations of minds, there runs

,826] HEILP FR,OM HISTORY 89

through §11 the same human principle in which
our hearts are constrained to find a consanguin-
ity, and so to make the registers of history a rule
of life. In this way Moses and Solomon, Afci-
biades and Bonaparte have existed for ^e ; the
fortunes of Assyria, of Athens and (>f Rome have
not become a dead letter — have not fulfilled
their effect in the universe, till they have taught
me and you, ^nd all men to whose ears these
.names may come, all the lessons of manners, of
political and religious causes, and of a high para-
mount Providence which the great scripture of
a nation’s history contains. This is the immor-
tality of.moral truth, which is not a vague name,
a trumpet flourish, but a thing of incessant ac-
tivity from age to age ; and the errors and suc-
cesses of Cicero become impelling motives to
thou^nds of men though now, for nineteen cen-
turies, his toggue has been dumb.

^t” is an important observation that thougK
our {)erception of moral truth is instinctive, and
we do not owe to education our approbation of.
truth or our abhorfence’o/ ingratitude, yet we
are not born to any image of perf^t virtue. We
recognize with faithful feadiness the virtue and
the vice of action ptesented to us, but we need
a learned experience to enutnerate all the partic-

po JOURNAL [Age 2z

ulars that make the whole of virtue. i).nd many
a mind after studying men and books for twenty'
or thirty years has found fn the story of an an-
cient hero a quality or colour of moral worth
which he adds to this image, this growing God-
head within him. .

I am answerable for whatever wisdom I can
glean from the wisdom of Rome ; for whatever
counsel I can extract from the deftth of so many
heroeaand the decline of so many nations. Thia
should shame pedantry.

TO MY CORRESPONDENT IN WATERFORD'

April io,.i 826 .

’T is a curious measure to see what a fragment,
what a span of time, our intellectual history
would*' subtract from life. The oil and wine of
existence, the moral and intellectual nature, are
grudgingly dealt out by the atom^at long inter-
val of dull sensual pain and comfort. And \^hat
reason to suppose it will be otherwise when we
get rid of the clay, now that our ancient tradi-
tions are .tottering tp ruin around us*? To what
good purpose this cumbrous apparatus of good
and evil? Sages of all ‘sects answer, ’Tis a dis-
cipline. These are the gyrAnasties in which the

I ^Us Emerson.

,826] LETTER TO HIS AUNT 91

youth of t^e universe are reared. Aye, but ’t is'
^lain that the bigger part of mankind die in a
state of little coftipailitive preparation for high
event, for moral sacrifice, for intercourse wiifh
angels and “ ardours,” and that all come ^ery far
short of theif own conception of suitableness to
die. Of course, the light of nature countenabces
the notion of a proper Purgatory, of an island
between evil add good where the poor tempest-
driyen sufferers must perform sad quarantine to
purge out the sores of human nature that might
infect or offend the society of heaven. I do not
apprehend the grounds, if they exist, of believ-
ing we shall launch at once into any free and
pure element of thought, in which it will be in-
definitely quickened in its processes and exalted
in its tone. For this must come from within, not.
from \vithout. What external help can be af-
forded, I hav^ no doubt will be afforded, and
this^chiefly in two ways, — an increased facility
of locomotion, anj^ of social intercourse, and tlus
at once removes the chief impediments that in
this world obstruct our eduq^tion. *When there-
fore we escape from life, we shall qpt perchance
escape from disappointment; from indolence and
the punishment of indolence — ennui — from the
frequent sense of incapacity Snd of immense in-

92 JOURNfAL [Age 22

ferlorlty. Hope has a thousand times cheated us
here, and we may find reasons, now too subtle
for our apprehension, to be dissatisfied, even
with the immense advancement promised us in
that uiicertain and silent infinity. The whole of
truth (it has. been nobly said) will not probably
be found injurious to the whole of virtue. They
will be found to be seal and print. It is the nec-
essary consequence of this doctrine, that a great
progress of knowledge — and nothing on earth
has a title to the name — will be a great progress
in goodness. But happiness, we know, belongs
only to the last. It follows, that periods of study,
long courses of initiation in the ccjleges of
heaven, may waste away before the soul of a man
in heaven may begin to be happy. Is it then a
false r>.ssociation that, among men, from the rise
of this great doctrine of the Reformation, has
coupled the ideas of heaven and happiness? If
riches cannot confer this excellence in 6urth,
neither can knowledge (except remotely, as ex-
plained) confer it in heaven.

ptJblic prayer.

Cambridge, April 12, 1826.

Most men, who have given their attention to
the prayers publicly offered in a Christian con-

i8*6] IPUBUC PRAYER 93

gregation, have felt in the institution an un-
’ suitableness to their feelings. They have found
themselves reacfy, in* their own exculpation, to
accuse a certain stubbornness of sympathy in
their natural disposition, or else their pgist lives
of such discbntinuance of the offices of piety as
has issueci in a total incapacity of joining their
fellowmen in this venerable service. Disuse has
made their cohtemplations of their Creator cold
and ungrateful to their understandings. The man
who prays is in quite another mood from the
man who hears, and tones and language which
we have once become accustomed to regard with
suspicion, or at best with admiration, it will be
long ere we learn to listen to them with sympa-
thy. The truth is, public prayer is rather the
offspring of our notions of what ought* to be,
than Qf what is. It has grown out of the senti-
ment of a fe^^^ ratljer than the reason of many.
Indeed we have said all, — and I am sorry^to
say it", — in char^terizing it as an appeal to our
veneration, instead of our sympathy.

That it ’is right to ask Qod’s blessing on us
is certainly reasonable. That it is *ight to enu-
merate our wants, our sin*s, dven our sentiments,
in addresses to'this unseen Idea, seems just and
natural. And it may probaBly b^ averred with

94 JOURNAL [Aob 22

safety that there has been no man who never
prayed. That persons whom like circumstances
and like feelings assimilatiy that a family, that a
picked society of friends, should unite in this
service, does not, I conceive, violate any precept
of just reascBi. It certainly is a question of more
difficult solution whether a promiscuous assem-
blage, such as is contained in houses of public
worship, and collected by such motives, can
unite.with propriety to advantage in any petition
such as is usually offered by one man.

PROGRESS OF AN INDIVIDUAL IN [CNOWLEDGE

April.

Every cultivated man observes, in his past
years, intervals of mentality — and is accustomed
to consider the present state of his mind as the
result rather of many periods of singular intense-
ness of thought and feeling thaq-of a perpetual
and equable expansion. Corn grows by jumps.
The ordinary growth of mind., especially till the
old age of man, depends on aliment procured
from without. But this aliment for which we
search the bosoms of other men, or their books,
or the face of exterifal nature, will be got in larger
or less amounts according to circumstances quite
as often withput aS within our controul.

,826] KEYS OR KNOWLEDGE 95

Whoever explores his recollection of those
periods, will find that by some casualty or some
study he had rfrriv*^ at one of those general
ideas which not only epitomize whole trains'of
thought, but cast a flood of new light upqn things
inscrutable *before ; after waiting 'mostly in the
vestibule, had picked up unawares the Master
Key, whose wards and springs open every door,
and the surprtsed adventurer goes on astonished
•frpm cell to cell, from chamber to chamber,
gratified, but overawed at the unexplored extent
and opulence of his own possessions.*

May 20.

Any degree of profoundest consideration is
due to the least action before it is performed,
and afterwards the least.

“ We are purified by terror and pity.”

[Aristotle ?]

FRIENDSHIP

Cambridge, May 28.

Friendship is something very 4 elicious to my
understanding. Yet the friends that occupy my

I Compare the third paragiyph^in “ Education,” Works,
vol, X ; also in Poems, Appendix, Centenary Edition, p. 357,
lines beginning, *

With the Key of the Secret h* marchq faster,** etc.

96 JOURNAL [Agb 43

thoughts are not men, but certain phantoms
clothed in the form and face and apparel of men
by whom they were suggeslitd and to whom they
bear a resemblance. The gods gave life to Prome-
theus’s ivory statue, and the revolution of events
may one day ^ive me the men for the prototypes.

You love your friend for your sake, not for
his own, might say Hobbists and wolves, for
you would not have that good fortune befall
him that should raise him above your reach'
and your society. I please myself that I can
dimly see how it would gratify me to promote
that very good fortune of my friend.’ In God’s
name what is in this topic? It encourages, ex-
hilarates, inspires me. I feel that the affections
of the soul are sublimer than the faculties of
the intellect. I feel immortal. And the evidence
of immortality comes better from consciousness
than from reason.

STYLE

A man’s style is his intellectfual voice, only in
part under hir contronl. P has its own proper

I Have I a lover

Who»’s noble and free ?

1 would he were nobler

<•

Than to love me.

Poems, “The Sphinx."

,8261 9EED-XHOUGHTS 97

tone and manner, which, when he is not think-
•ing of it, it will always assume. He can mimic
the voices of oth«rs,4te can modulate it with the
occasion and the passion, but it has its own iYi-
dividual nature.

[hints of history]

Ballads, mots, anecdotes, give us better
insight into tlfe depths of past centuries than
grave and voluminous chronicles. " A Straw,”
says Selden, “ thrown up into the air will show
how the wind sits, which cannot be learned by
casting up e stone.”

(From ‘‘XVIII, ” zd)

yune, 1826 .

I pursue my speculations with confidence and,
though I can discern no remoter conclusion, I
doujjt not the<:rain.I commence extends farther
than I see, as the first artificer of glass did not
know he was instructing men in astronomy, and
restoring sight to those frpm whopi nature had
taken it. U*here is no thought which is ‘not seed
as well as fruit. It spawns like fish?

When success exalts thy lot
God for thy virtue lays a plot j

98 JOURNAL [Age *3

And all thy life is for thy own, ^

Then for mankind’s instruction shewn ;

And, tho’ thy knees r/pre rever bent.

To heaven thy hourly prayers are sent.

And whether formed for good or ill.

Are registered and answered still.'

l. ‘

ProverbSy chapter 2, 18. The Jewish phi-
losopher did not know that the soul survived
the body, yet there seemed to him a peculiar
sympathy and conjunction between vice apd
death, and the idea was natural, and suggests the
evidence we have from nature of the immortal-
ity of the soul. The intellections of the mind
are scarcely discriminated from the sensations
which occasion them. They end in themselves
and do not imply the notions of merit and
reward. But moral actions seem not a mere

1 The last four lines had this origin : The summer be-
,/ore, when Emerson had gone to hie UncL Ladd’s in New-
ton to restore his health, he was talking with his companion,
a Methodist labourer, named Tarbox, ps they worked in the
hay-field. Tarbox said, that men were always prayings and
that their prayers were answered. On these two heads the
young divine wrote his first sermon, adding the comment.
Then men must ^e careful wl^at they pray for. This was the
sermon preached in Waltham, October 1 5, 1826, Next day,
in the stage-coach, a farmer said to him, ** Voung man, you’ll
never preach a better sermon than that.”

,826J letter to his aunt 99

bundle facts, but of relations, relations to*
%omething unseen, and because thus related to
something to wlfich*iflhe body was not, possess
for themselves a principle of life in which the
body had no share. Since Virtue was in^perish-
able, every ‘act contrary to ,it would seem to
tend to the destruction of the agent. Vice is
the soul’s suicide.

R. W. E. TO MISS EMERSON

Cambridge, June 15, 1826.

I rejoice 4n the prospect of better sight and
better health. Seasons and calendars have little
to do with him who distinctly sees eternity writ
upon his dial, but on earth his impatience is ir-
repressible, who finds his years increasing,jvhilst
his m^ans of acquisition are withdrawn. Loss
of eyes is not ^xactly one of Socrates’s super-
fluiftes. How many things do I not want. For
when 'I came bacP^ to books, I felt like Colum-
bus on the new shore. The value of this art (of
reading), when remembere4 ^ m*an’s addition
to his wealth, is the best argun\pnt of per-
fectibility, and is a sound'oite. Alas for Adam !
— not Milton^s not* Moses’, — but the first
adventurer that was accomplished^ only with his

ICX> JOUR^^:AL [Acb 23

own perfections; the noble savage whom poets
extol, the wretch whom philosophers pity. Alas
for his joyless hours, though m powers and dis-
positions perfectly moulded, and in understand-
ing profound as a god, the better his under-
standing of good, the keener his perception of
surrounding evil. We should be glad if the next
periods of our existence were only so much an
improvement on this as the m^n of the 60th
centu,yy is a being of greater powers and re-
sources than the man of the first. Yet Campbell
does not lament the loss of the sun, because all
the arts

“ And triumphs that beneath thee sprang
Healed not a passion or a pang
Entailed on human hearts.”

All which I am fain to call sublime lying. For
’t is the noble and exhilarating discovery of mod-
ern grand juries, and the more noble thkf it is
more trite, that educated men are never brought
to the bar for felonious crimes, and that the all
but imrnedicable crimes of drunkenness and in-
dolence have found their antidote in the love of
reading.

I have not forgiven E'^erett one speculative
doctrine of the < 1 } B K oration, the more dis-

,826] THE MyNDANE SOUL loi

agreeable, that I have found some reason tothinic
it true, — to wit, that geniuses are the organs,
mouthpieces oftheir^age ; do not speak their own
words, nor think their own thoughts. It has»oc-
curred to me that, though we think Shakspeare
so singularly grand as to be a hernyt in the fields
of thought where'he travels, yet we bind’up in
his volumes four or five plays of which the
authorship i? disputed betwixt him and certain
unknown contemporaries. Other productions
modern criticism has quoted from his tin\e, bear-
ing very respectable comparison with his own.
So that tile time, not the man, gave birth to
this empyrean conceit.

’T is not in man to thank the philosopher that
merges his selfish in the social nature. ’T was a
foolish vanity in the Stoic to talk in tjjis wise.
It suggested or else grew out of that primeval
dogma of the Mundane Soul. No man loves it;
tlfe 'meanest loses more than he gains by parf-
ing'with his identity to make an integral atom
of the Whole. Nor perhaps need we dread any-
thing. If any one feelirfg^is positive, it is per-
sonal accountability. I know that I exist, but
the age and the Univetse* are alike abstractions
of my own mind, und have no pretensions to
the same definitive certainty. One can some-

102 JOURNi^L [Age 23

times feel pretty clearly where these fancies origi-
nate, when we observe the grouping together
of men into generations anti countries, and the
dismally gregarious manner in which they walk
and talk and think. If men were like Phoenixes,
and only at Icyig secular intervals the world tra-
vailed with this noble progeily, we should feel
more secure of ourselves both now and here-
after. But this fulsome generatior.’, this redun-
dant pr9digality of being, whereby they are cast
out, clean and unclean, heroes and underlings,
by millions, — begets a doubt whether the
riches of eternity can be as prodigally <«pent, and
whether such immense resources as each one
feels his own capacities crave can be furnished
from the storehouses of God to every one of
the individuals of these inconceivable numbers
of systems of life. It is indeed pleasing to the
mind, as she sits serene in her own firmament,
to find from her nature that these doubts hate
no lorce, that the physical limit to physical in-
crease is a humble law of material nature which

t

does not taint her majesty. Speedily she expects
a divorce from her gross mate, who, because he
hungers and thirsts, niakes her forsake her
celestial musings to find out wherie he may go
to be fat and where to be warm. But when this

1826] THE SPHlirs SOCIETY 103

dissolution shall have taken place, no incongru-
»ity is seen in the project of an immeasurable
multiplication of sentient individuals. There is
no bankruptcy in the commerce of thought'to
be occasioned from an overdoing of ijs craft.
Mind has 1I0 relation that we know to space.
All the ahalogies o*f matter are, in this regard,
inapplicable to the intensity of the enjoyment
(though hard \o analyze, or at any moment to
say “It is now”) which we, in this worjd, ex-
tract from friendship, and to which we continu-
ally see the “Miscreator Circumstance”* to be
an insuperable bar, estranging us from charac-
ter’s to wjiich we feel an affinity, and separating
us from those to whom we are already allied.
This great element, the social principle, instructs
us in the mystery of future happiness sug-
gesting the noble and endless entertainment that
a free access to innumerable minds out of clay,
and'skiey influences is of itself able to furnish.*
But all men feel iheir incompetency to uncover
the secret employments of the emancipated
spirit, and* the silly donceit^of singers and chil-
dren about the psalm-singing of th)^ other world
is not more inadequate p«?rhHps than the concep-
tion of a passive reteiver or channel through
I Byron’s exprt^ion.

104 JOURNAL [Age 23

which flows forever the stream of immortal
thought. We can determine something in this,’
as in all general speculatidr.s, by consulting the
whole of our nature, and we find ourselves
emascu,lated by a description that leaves out
our active fr.culties. Yet the appVopriate ob-
jects of our action we shall hot easily‘ ascertain.
All our action here is material, and that to such
an extent as to have induced a metaphysical
doubt,'whether action is predicable of mind. Al-
most all suffering, exercising the soul’s fortitude,
is of the body. Indeed, I would submit whether
a philosopher subjecting his griefs to'/igid analy-
sis will not find them all to be ultimately re-
lated to body, unless it be the apprehension of
the disesteem of others, and of annihilation.
Now rction and sufferance go hand in hand.

None can aspire to act greatly but those who
are of force greatly to suffer,” said Burke. And
it would seem all our action and passion are'’'of
the body. I do not say the mind does not act
when, for example, it prefers honesty to guilty
wealth, but it is cleqr the things about which it
is concerned are of body, not of mind, — as
whether the hand, foot' or tongue shall move in
a certain way. Nor can we' conceive of virtuous
action in the soul fending in the soul. Yet wc

AS TO MATTER

1826]

105

•

should be very loth to add to modern vagaries
the dogma that master was essential to virtue.
We know better. W*e know that all speculation
of this sort pushed to any extreme is inconclusive
and idle, for the nature of matter, as of mind, is
buried in inscrutable night ; and that we are^fools
to fear Matter when we do not know that there
is any such thing. What, then, do we know? I
know that I *exist, and that a part of me, as
•essential as Memory or Reason, is a desire that
another being exist. If I am not an anomaly,
but was made, and what is within was made,
with reference to what is without, then there is
another Reing who made me. And having such
intuitions, such golden rudiments whereof to
frame my history, I can look unappalled at the
future, and welcome the coming on K)f my
untried Being.

R. W.* E. TO MISS EMERSON (?)

^Cambridge, June 30, 1826.

In all the vagaries I have troubled you with,
not much has been said of poetry, though a sub-
ject near to us both. I should b% glad to see
your thoughts on its ge*nefal nature and value.
Does the continuation of your own speculations
shew its fairy web to be superficial, or wrought

io6 JOURNAL [Aob 23

into the grain of man? Is it left behind as we
advance, or is it more perfect in the Archangel '
than in the child? And for the professors of
the art, can they not err by excess of relish for
the same? It would seem that the genuine bard
must be one" in whom the extremes of human
genius meet ; that his judgment must be as ex-
act and level with life as his imagination is dis-
cursive and incalculable. It would seem as if
abundant erudition, foreign travel, and gym-
nastic exercises must be annexed to his awful
imagination and fervent piety to finish Milton.
That the boisterous childhood, careless of criti-
cism and poetry, the association of vulgar and
unclean companions, were necessary to balance
the towering spirit of Shakspeare, and that
Mr. Wordsworth has failed of pleasing by being
too much z.poet.

A man may propose a course of exercises
designed to strengthen his arm with such indis-
creet zeal as to paralyze it. A boy enamoured
of the beauty of a butterfly chases and clutches
it with such eagerner.s that he finds his hand full
of dirt and blood. I can’t read this poet’s mys-
tic and unmeaning verses without feeling that
if he had cultivated poetry less, alld learning and
society more, he wduld have gained more favour

WORDSWORTH

1826]

107

at the h%nds of the Muses, who must be courte'd,
not taken by violence. 'T is sufficient proof of
a man’s aberration* to know that he is writing
verses on a theory; that he has agreed with»two
or three antics more to bring the publjc over to
a new tasfe in poetry.

It wduld seem* there was some kindred be-
tween this new philosophy of poetry and the
undisciplined enterprizes of intellect in the mid-
dle age. The geniuses of that era, all on fire
with that curiosity which is, in every age,’inextin-
guishable, to break the marble silence of Nature
andopentfome intercourse between man and that
divinity with which it seems instinct, struggled
to grasp the principles of things, to extort from
the spheres in the firmament some intimations
of the present or some commentary on the past.
Th^y were impatient of their straitened domin-
ion over nature, and were eager to explore the
Sfccrets of her own laboratory, that they might
refi'ne clay and^iron into gold, might lengthen
life and deduce formulas for the solution of all
those mysteries that beside the human adven-
turer. N ot otherwise this moderg poet, by nat-
ural humour an ardeni? lover of all the enchant-
ments of wood ahd river and seduced by an
overweening confidence irf the force of his own

io8 JOURNAL [Ace *3

g'enius, has discarded that modesty un4er whose
influence all his great precursors have resorted
to external nature sparingly »for illustration and
ormment, and have forborne to tamper with the
secret apd metaphysical nature of what they
borrowed. He has^ been foolishly 'inquisitive
about the essence and body of what pleased him,
of what all sensible men feel to be, in its nature,
evanescent. He can’t be satisfied with feeling
the general beauty of a moonlight evening, o,r
of a rose. He would pick them to pieces and
pounce on the pleasurable element he is sure is
in them, like the little boy who cufc open his
drum to see what made the noise. The. worthy
gentleman gloats over a bulrush, moralizes on
the irregularity of one of its fibres, and suspects
a connejcion between an excrescence of the plant
and its own immortality. Is it not much more
conformable to that golden middle line in which
all that is good and wise of life lies, to let wn?it
Heaven made small and casual,remain the ’ob-
jects of a notice small and casual, and husband
our admiration for injages of grandeurnn matter
or in mind ? ^ut I should not worry myself with
abusing Mr. Wordswt)rtti, not even for his se-
rene egotism, whereby he sfeems at every turn
thunderstruck to see to what a prodigious height

WORDSWORTH

1826]

109

human gfnius has headed up in hinty but that
•he has occasionally written lines which I think
truly noble. wcnild be unworthy your no-
tice but that now and then comes from him a
flash of divine light and makes you unejsy that
he should 5e such an earthen ve«sel. He has
nobly embodied a sentiment, which, 1 know not
why, has always seemed congenial to humanity,
that the soul has come to us from a preexist-
£nce in God; that we have a property in the
past which we do not ourselves recognize’, and a
title to the future for which we should be a lit-
tle thankful.' Wait a little, says this venerable
faith, and this feverish being for which you are
so anxious will be whelmed in a vaster being to
which it is only subsidiary ; but let the glory and
virtue of other worlds be as they may, in part-
ing wjth our identity we part with happiness.

Every age, as it augments the number of the
successful experiments of genius, whilst it shoulcf
seem to furnish tUat large induction from whence
we can ascertain the true extent and nature of

1 It may be interesting to refer Jn this connccyon to what
Mr. Emerson said later of Wordsworth ; of his personality
and his poetry in English Traits^ chapters i, xiv, and xvii,
and also in the papers froip the Dial^ Modern Literature ”
and ** Europe and European Bool^/’ in volume xii of the
Works.

no JOURNiiL [Age 23

poetry, has rather appeared to carry its title into
new empires, and annex an import yet more
vague and universal to tht woi^d. What is po-
etry ? It is philosophy, it is humour,it is a chime
of two, or three syllables, it is a relation of
thought to things, or of language to thought.
It converses with all science and all imagination,
with all accidents and objects, from the grandest
that are accessible to the senses* and grander
than those, to the coarsest parts of life. And I
would go to the farthest verge of the green earth
to learn what it was or was not. If the spirit of
him who paced the Academe and hcd this vir-
tue in his soul, though he feigned to disparage
it in his philosophy, or the laurelled lovers of
the British Muse, harp in hand, sit on your
misty mount, or soothe their majesties by the
margin of your lakes, conjure them, I beseech
you, to announce this secret that the wit^ of
humanity has been so long in vain toiling ‘co
unriddle. It shall be reverently received, and
.cautiously dispensed, and shall add a rich item
to the scanty stock,, of truth of which your
friend is the j^umble master.

1826]

hKppiness

111

(From Cabot’s Q)

Cambridge, July a8, 1826.

There is but one meaning can be put upon
the term happiness consistent with vjhat our
experience *has shewn. It C9nsists*in reliefs, not
in enjoyhients ; and unhappiness is an uneasi-
ness, a useful uneasiness in the body or mind
prompting tb the attainment of some good
agreeable to its nature. That is to say. All
unhappiness tends to happiness.

(From “ XVIII,” 2d)

LETTER TO MISS EMERSON

i August y 1826.

T is a droll life, and the only humour proper
to it seems quiet astonishment. Others laugh,
weep^ sell or proselyte. I admire.' There are,
I take it, in each njan’s history insignificant pas-
sages which he feels to him not to be insignifi-
cant; little coincidences in little things, which
touch all the springs of wonder and startle the
sleeper Conscience in the deepest cell of his re-
pose, — the Mind with all her faculties rushing

out in alarm, suspicious of a Presence which it

• •

1 Probably suggested by St. Augustine’s exclamation.
Wrangle who will, I will wondc^.”

1112 JOURNAL [Age 23

*

greatly behooves her to respect — touched not
more with awe than with^ -curiosity, if perhaps
some secret revelation is not about to be vouch-
safed ; or doubtful if some moral epoch is not
just now fulfilled in its histoiy, and the tocsin
just ,now struck that severs and tolls out an
irreparable Past.

These are not the stale reasons by which we
can enforce the burdensome doctrine of Deity
on the world, but make often, I apprehend, the"
body of evidence on which private conviction is
built. In solitude and in silence Memory visits
her inmost chambers to produce thesfe treasured
tokens of -connexion and immortality. Much
of what is subtle and mysterious in our inter-
vals of mentality is more flattering and more
favoured than the ordinary acquisitions in the
general progress of the soul, and — bufwhat
pongratulation ought to be>hear/i in the e?rth
from theist and patriot when God, in these erni-
nent instances of these our latier days, departs
from the ancient inviplable sternness of an un-
respecting Providence to harmonize the order
of nature wirii the moral exigencies of humanity.
Arise from the dust, put on thy beautiful cloth-
ing, oh thou that wast despised for depravity,
want and presumption ! Human nature will go

1826] W'EBSTER 1 13

daft in our time, like the Grecian father who
embraced two Olympian victors in one day.

(From Cabot’s Q)

Cambridge, August 3, >826.

Yesterday I attended the* funeral solemnities
in Faneuil Hall in honour of John Adams and
Thomas Jefferson. The oration of Mr. Web-
ster was worthy of his fame, and what is much
'more, was worthy of the august occasion. Never,
I think, were the awful charms of person, man-
ners and voice outdone. For though in the be-
ginning unpromising, and in other parts imper-
fect, in what was truly grand ^he fully realized
the boldest conception of eloquence.

(From “XVIII,” zd)

TO'hIS brother, EDWARD BLISS EMERSON*

August 12.

Eyes SO rich, will atone for many petty un-
easinesses ; for hands that are poor, and (a little
while) for hopes deferred jnd affections fasting
for their food. In the long run, injthe great ex-
istence, they will vindicate* their paramount im-
portance and hold at a cheap rate the disappoint-

I Then travelling in Euro^ for^s health.

1 14 JOURNAL [Age 23

ment or even blight of a particular, affection.
For the wealth of the eye passes into the mind,’
elevating its tone, nourisliing ’its strength, en-
larging its proportions; and this godlike Inhab-
itant i» always a favourite, and can create for
itself new attachments whensoever and where it
chooses. Blood is a dear tie, and old love is not
easily forgotten, but this sort of feeling is but
a rag of wretched humanity, low itself and dwell-
ing in low places and striving to link its neces-
sities to lofty sentiment. But the soul sternly
assures us that there are affinities dearer and
truer, that these are perishing, but those eternal.

(From Cabot's R)

’ QUIDDLE

Excessive love of order denominated quiddle.
Apparent why it should be the mark of a weak
•mind, because proximity oP tim 4 and placi? he-
it^ the simplest of associations, a violation of
it in a mind where higher relations do not enter
must product painfubconffision.

TWO SORTS PEOPLE :

(i) Who find themselves in life, and content
themselves wijh locking at the great show they

1826] PEkSONAL 1 15

find around them, and (2) who like the game
^nd enter into it witJj spirit.

September 10, i8a6.*

The days blow me onward into the desarts
of Eternity ;* I live a few stfong moment^, in
the coursd, perhaps’, of each day ; I observe a
little the ways of man, and in them accumulated,
the ways of God. I act a little. I shape my for-
tunes, as it seems to me, not at all. For in all
my life I obey a strong necessity, and all that
sacrifice of time and inclination which certain
of my fond friends regard as virtue, I see and
confess t« be only a passive deference to the
course of events. F or, in reference to those pas-
sages of my life which please their moral sense,
I could not have done otherwise without*doing
violence to my own or my neighbour’s feelings.
There was, in those^ instances, in the very likely
sujTposition that I had disliked to play the mar-
tyr, no nook, nc* pretence such as commonly
falls to other people, under cover of which I
might plausibly declme tfiQ assured alternative
of inconvenience and loss. It is melancholy to
suffer on account of oth^rs'without any appeal
to our own self-devofion as the cause. It is low
and ridiculous to be the fodtball of vulgar cir-

ii6 JOURNAL [Age 2 }

cumstances and never by force of character to
have surmounted them. i\nd yet, inasmuch a^
the course of events in the Worfd appears to con-
se’nt to virtue, these regretted evils may be en-
nobled by being a portion of the sublime neces-
sity, which Knlcs ajl agents and events together
under an omnipotent jurisdiction. B6 the theo-
ries as they may, it suits my humour to sit and
speculate, a civil philosopher, mild and com-
posed in the presence of little and of majestic
minds; without contempt of reptiles, and, as the
stoics say, without being afraid of gods.

“growth of the mind” I

Our American press does not often issue such
productions as Sampson Reed's observations on
the Growth of the Mind, a book of such a char-
acter as I am conscious betrays some prefension
even to praise. It has to my mind the aspect of
a revelation, such is the wealth^and such isrthe

I A young man, an apothecary inGoston, had just written
a book with this title, which Emerson valued highly, and
which first interested hirn *in Swedenborg and his teachings.
In a letter written to Rev, James Freeman Clarke in 1834,
Mr. Emerson said, ** Hqvcfou read Sampson Reed’s Growth
of the Mind ? 1 rejoice to be contempo^rary with that man,
and cannot wholly despair of the society in which he lives.
There must be spme oxygen yet.’*

1826] EDWARD^ B. EMERSON 117

4

novelty of the truth unfolded in it. It is remark-
able for the unity into which it has resolved the
various powers, Teelkfgs and vocations of men,
suggesting to the mind that harmony, which' it
has always a propensity to seek, of action and
design in thd order of Provi 4 ence ki the world.

September 23.

Health, action, happiness. How they ebb
from me ! Poor Sisyphus saw his stone stop
once, at least, when Orpheus chaunted. I must
roll mine up and up and up how high a hill !
But hark, I^can hear on the eastern wind almost
the harp pf my coming Orpheus. He sets his
sail and flees over the grim flood.' Breathe soft
the winds, and shine warmly on him, the au-
tumnal sun. It may be, a contrary destii\y will
be too strong on me for the help of his hand.
But speed his bark, for his heart is noble and
hisjfand is strbng,*and the good of others is
given into his hagd.

It would give me very grea^t pleasure to be
well. It is mournful, the Expectation of ceasing
to be an object of hope, that we may become
objects of compassion, ami then go gloomily to
nothing, in the eye of* this world, before we have

1 Edward was on his return voyage from Europe.

Il8 JOURNAL [Age 23

had one opportunity of turning to the sun what
we know is our best side. But there havf
existed on earth noble tnoughts, and souls that
gave them free entertainment, which sentiments
were (designed as counterpoises to these very
sorrows, aiid consolation to worse distresses.
What is stoicism? what is Christianity? They
are for nothing (that is to say, the human mind
at its best estate and the Divine mind in its
communication with the human, are for. no-
thing), if they cannot set the soul on an equili-
brium, when it leans to the earth under the pres-
sure of calamity. I bless God, ther^ is virtue in
them. The warlike soul that has put on this
armour has come off conqueror. Little vexations
that eat into the hearts of meaner men were to
them that were of the household of this faith
dust and smoke; . . . they met with undaunted
eye and even temper. They felt the slow wast-
ing of disease which seems to consume theJJow-
ers of resistance whilst it augments the force of
the attack. The fires, that hope had kindled up
in the firmament within, were seen to wane in
their light, and, star by star, were slowly extin-
guished ; but ther^ was that in them of robust
virtue, that derived a blameless triumph from
contrasting the health of the soul with the de-

,826] SUPERIOR SOULS 1 19

cay of its house; the eternity of the universe
'with the transition of its parts ; the grandeur of
the ends, themselves were pursuing, with the
puny weakness of the instruments; the immor-
tal life, the great, the immeasurable, thg over-
whelming progression of the Mi«d, with the
little pas^ng cloud of tears, decline and death
with which it was afflicted on earth. These things
they thought* on and were comforted. These
•were the good angels that gathered before them
on the holy mount of their hope, and beckoned
them to walk boldly forward in the vallies of
life, proof <0 temptation, and not afraid of trial,
overlooking the crosses and accidents of the
way, for their bright and burning eye was fixed
steadfastly on the future.

Thus much must serve me for a consolatory
soliloquy now; or for a sermon by and by, if
I prosper better than I at this present appre-
hend. These that have been said, are the stated,
the official consolations. There is another Icey
on which vulgar understandings are sometimes
to better purpose kldres?ed. Op, yp ! faint
heart never won fair lady.

No, there a necessity in fate

Why still the brave, bold man is fortunate !

lao journKl [Age *3

»

Die ? What should you die for ? Maladies ?
What maladies? Dost not; know that Nature
has her course as well as 'Disease? that Nature
has not only helps and facilities for all beneficial
operations, but fangs and weapons for her ene-
mies also? Die? pale face, lily liver! go about
your business, and when it comes to the point,
then die like a gentleman.

Christianity ... in its purified and primi-
tive state, makes one with the moral code.
They ' cast mutual light and honour on each
other. The doctrine of immortality, the grand
revelation of Christianity, illuminates and en-
nobles the existence of man.

This solves the question concerning the ex-
istence of evil. For if man is immortal, this
world ‘s his place of discipline and the value of
pain is then disclosed. . . .

The most absurd and frivolous superstitions
have been defended as the most precious doc-
trines which Jesus Christ came into the world
to teach. These insane tenets have been sanc-
tioned by Councils ,and sealed by the blood of
martyrs. An age went by; a revolution in men’s
minds took place, and 'these famous dogmas are
pleasantly quoted to amuse an idle hour and
speedily are forgotien. And now, it may be, an-

1826] DbUBTS I2I

9

other set of opinions is taught in Councils, and
Wlustrated in pulpits: but what security is there
that these are more 'genuine than those that
went before, or that another age may not treat
them with the same irreverence ? And in this
shifting speclacle, is not a doubt thrown v^pon
the gospel* itself, which is thus represented to
different ages in such contradictory lights ?

: Poison, poison, poison; the poison of vanity,
the poison of fear, the poison of testirnony.
“ Poison expels poison, and vices are expelled
by pride.”

“ The .enigma of ourselves swallows up,
like the Sphinx, thousands of systems which
pretend to the glory of having guessed its
meaning.” De Stael.

(From “XVIII,” zd)

R. W% E. to MISS EMERSON

September 28, 1826.

Hume, all grimace apart, you honour as a
genuine scholar, as an exac^ and powerful phi-
losopher, without a single word of d^lness, and
with this single qualificatfon* of praise, that be-
cause of the noVeltyo'f the ground he had taken,
he was seduced from the gra^d view of human

122

JOURNAL [Age 23

nature which he ought to have taken, into a
consideration, too partial and minute, of the de-
fective nature of our reasoning; and this, enter-
ing into all his habits of thinking, chilled and
belittled (compared with a true, with a religious
wisdom) all this philosophy. In the history of
metaphysics and ethics, however, the advantage
is of course great. The experiment might not
have been tried under better auspices, and every
experiment must once be made. Of his friend
Gibbon, I think there can be but one idea
among people of good feeling and sense. He
was a sort of Alcibiades whom all the instruc-
tions of Socrates might adorn, but could not
purify. Then Shakspeare and Burke. The old
poet is crushed under his laurels, and you would
hardly>withdraw a leaf, but for the indecency of
the old stage. It was queer ; a sort of represen-
tation of humanity, that the truest of all bards
should be permitted thus to mix the highest and
vilest. Heroism, virtue, devotion thrown into
these brothel associations. But the words of
Brutus in Julius C^sar will search out a sym-
pathy in the purest heart that ever turned a se-
vere eye on the spotted web of human intellect.
But why maul the old idol ? We think alike of
him. Then we can J^ave no quarrel about Burke,

EVERETT

1826]

123

an improved Cicero; improved precisely in the
proportion of the advanced age. ... As to
what is met front our ’American press, I can’t
but think the glowing epithets that come down
from the mountains are a full echo of the
applause of the valleys. I think of our orators.
For one’s neputatiorf’s sake ’tis always well to
stick in a word to qualify admiration, and you
should have heird us tax, in Everett, the want
of an abounding, delicate philosophy not at all
compensated by the dazzle of the imagery.
Moreover, there is in many minds a certain
dulness to perceive God ; not so quick a habit
of detecting and confederating final causes,
whence He is inferred. But for diligence, recti-
tude, fancy and sense we reckon FMward Ever-
ett chief among ten thousand. •

Nextj it seems I am cold, and when shall I
kindle? I was born cold. My bodily habit is
cold# I shiver in !lnd out; don’t heat to the good
purposes called enthusiasm a quarter so quick*
and kindly as my neighbours. Yet, so depraved
is self-conceit, that I s’omefiijies imagined this
very seed of wrath to be one of my gifts, though
not graces. “ Poor mortals do themselves be-
guile.”

JOURNAL

[Agb 23

124

TO THE SAME

October.

But what, in the name of all the fairies, is the
reaso^n you don’t like Sampson Reed? What
swart star has looked sparely on him ? Can any-
thing be more greatly, more wisely writ ? Has
any modern hand touched the harp of great
nature so rarely ? Has any looked so shrewdly
into the subtile and concealed connexion of man
and ’nature, of earth and heaven? Has any, in
short, produced such curiosity to see the farther
progress, the remoter results, of the caste of in-
tellect to which he belongs ? I speak for myself,
and not for another. I believe he must have
admirers, but I have not seen any. The Sab-
bath after it came out. Dr. Channing delivered
a discourse obviously founded upon it. And,
as to his sect, you know they exult in the in-
dependent testimony of poor* Wordsworth, to
the same truths which they get from Sweden-
borg. Lo ! what confirmations to what I said
about sentiment ruling the roast in these our
matchless times. What holiday the easy satirist
might hold in pleasant observance of the fickle
world, but for the iron fiite that levels the des-
tiny of each with the destiny of all, and afflicts

1826] APPROBATED TO PREACH 125

the observer with the same evil and folly which’
•he analyzes.

[On October 10, the young divinity student,
having, though irregularly, studied what seemed
to the authprities enough to make suclf action
on their part safe, had been “approbated to
preach” by the Middlesex Association of Min-
isters. He hjd, even a month or two before
this, preached his first sermon in his Uncle
Ripley’s pulpit in Waltham ; and after his
approbation preached in his father’s, the First
Church, in Boston.]

(From Cabot^s R)

“ Le triomphe de la raison c*est de bien vivre
avec ceux qui n’en ont pas.” Voltaire.'

HOUSE OF HAVE AND HOUSE OF M Al^

See the 68th number of the §luarterly Review
fcyr some prodigiously fine remarks at the close
of the GeologicjJ article.

Rombold’s opinion, who died on the Rye
House plot, quoted* by Je/ferson : — jnen sad-

1 In the fragmentary verses in the Appen*itx to Emerson's
PoemSi this saying is versified tftus*: —

Af all wit's uses the main one
Is to live well with who have none.

126 JOURNAL [Agb 23

died and bridled for others booted and spurred,*
etc. Burnet.

DISPROPORTION

All vice is built on the apparent dispropor-
tion th'tre is between the temptation to do wrong
and^the motive to do right. The contest that
exists between these opposite influen'ces is like
no other strife in nature. It is no combat be-
tween beings of the same blood, oT equal might,
of the like nature, between sword and sword,
or wit and wit.*

IMMORTALITY

That fate and metaphysical aid do deem that
I shall be great or small, is of little "moment,
so that the great hope of spirits militant be sure.
For who can doubt but that, in the ages of
intercourse that impend with spirits of every
degree of grandeur, be it of thought or of vir-
tue, he can fail to find his own leypl, or fear to be
robbed of his just fame ? But shake down this
blessed doctrine of the Resurrection, towards
which the wise and good, the countless genera-

1 Quotc 3 in essay on Aristocracy^ Works, vol. x, p, 45
and note. The liame is usually spelled Rumbold.

2 Mrs. Julia Ward Howe relates Mr, Emerson^s instruc-
tion to her, when a young girl, that the Angel must always
be stronger than the evil spirit.

GOD IN HISTORY

1826]

127

tions of men as they scanned in their little day
fhe impending future^^have darted their desiring
eyes — to which 'every conclusion of the intel-
lectual power and every effort of the moral
power have pointed, from the first glimmering
of human history, and you have dcme more#for
ruin than ‘if you had shaken down the stars
from their courses. And after this downfall, all
things here befow, or there above, are so insig-
ni%ant to us, who are to be connected with
them but a moment, that fame which we nick-
name immortality is but the shadow of a shade.

HISTORY

'T is not always easy to separate what princi-
ples are robust and stable, what in humanity is
immoveably moored, from what is tosscdmpon
the waves of time. Few things need more phi-
losophy than the study of history. For it is
not* easy or safe* to look long on these turning
wheels, lest we gr(*w giddy. The best good that
is reaped, is the glorious congregation of final
causes, that is marshalled as \his Muse descends
from age to age ; the indisputable tribute they
bring of obedience and hbnbur to Deity. The
examination of*a single idea with the eye of ex-
act philosophy leads to atheisi^ and to universal

128 JOURNAL [Age

doubt; is susceptible of all the criticism with
which Mr. Hume assailed, the sources of know-
ledge. But many ideas confederated compel men
to believe. I need observe that ’tis no result
of accumulated inquiry that has brought into
doqbt the faithfulness of the senses; for, in
Plato’s Pbtedon, Socrates mentions that the poets
sing that “we neither see nor hear truly”; but
what was moonshine then is philosophy now.

I have heard Shakspeare’s “ Blow winds and
crack your cheeks,” and the rest, accused of
false taste and bombast. I do not find this fault.
And though I might not allow it in another,
even in his mad* king, yet I am not offended by
this passage in Lear. For as the Romans were
so idolatrous of Cato’s virtue that when he had
drunk wine they would rather believe that in-
temperance was virtue than that Cato was guilty
of a vice, so I am afraid to circumscribe within
rhetorical rules, the circuits of such a towering
and majestic mind, and a taste the most ex-
quisite that God evef infdrmed among men.'

“ We seem to recognize a truth the first time
we hear it.” Fontenelle.

I The three Jast paragraphs are dated 1825.

1826) JESUS CHRIST 129

Cambridge, November ^ 1826.

I would write sqj^ething worthily on the
most affecting of topics, upon the personal char-
acter and influence and upon the death of Jesus
Christ, a being whose nature has divided the
opinions of men more than did ev%r any ques-
tion ; who* was so great as to leave foundation
for the idea that he was a portion of the Deity,
and, in the opmions least reverent, that he was
fir^t of men ; a being who would be called re-
nowned, did not fame and what men call glory
sink before his majesty into things offensive and
ridiculous > a human being whose influence on
the fortunes of human society — taking out of
account all supernatural influence — has been
far the most powerful foreign influence that ever
acted thereon ; a being whose character was so
pure a^d whose death was so sublime as, if no
consequences had followed, would for himself
hat^e attracted ftie greatest admiration.

[H ere follow several quotations from Mme.
de Stael’s Germany.

I find in Burke almo.lt Ihe same thought I
had entertaine*d as an original remark three
years ago: that nothing but^the^ moral quality

130 JOURNAL [Age 23

of actions can penetrate through vast intervals
of time. ^ ,

• •••••••

'^‘The Translator,” says Butler, ‘‘is a small
Factor that imports Books of the growth of one
language in^o another ; but it seldom turns to
account, for the commodity is perisliable, and,
the finer it is, the worse it endures transporta-
tion, as the most delicate of Indian fruits are by
no art to be brought oven”

(From ‘‘XVr’)

The spirits of the wise sit on the clouds
And mock the ambition of man,

For his breath is vapour, his beauty the colour of a
cloud,

And b»s body and soul are parted by a sun, a storm.
Or the feeble fork of a poor worm :

And who shall tell his household

Whither the soul of the dead man /s gone ? ^

Is it gone to live in torture, ^

Enduring a dread resurrection into pain,

And perceive mortal plagues Jn an immortal body,
Sighing fo the heavy ‘centuries, that bring
No light, n(5 hope in their immeasurable train ?

Is it gone to farther regions yf unequal lot,

To a land where the colours of love and disgust
Are blended anew ifi the texture of the web,

i8z6] life or death 131

And the web is stained with black and bloody clouds*?
Is it gone to harmonies of joy,

To the ardour of virtuJ and the wealth of truth ?

Is it gone to blank oblivion,

The mockery of hope and virtue, and the deatli of
God.?

Alas ! Alas ! Alas !

Wo is me ! for the sad survivor!

Tho’ Fortune threw good, not evil, in his way.
Showering the roses of pleasure and the laurel of
, Fame,

Whilst his brother breasted the driving snows —

Alas for the sad survivor !

He walks jhe long streets of his native city.

But the peopled street is like the desolate sea.

Men study his face and its lofty Knes,

And love the graceful tones of pride and power
Rolled with rich thunder of eloquent words.

In the bosom of his own land
They*love him and they honour him.

And they think^his heart leaps at the voice of their
praise.

But their thought? arc dark and their eyes are dim.
And they cannot see that a noble nature
Must pine, or be matched witii noble things.

It is ill with the living, it is well with ^he dead.

It is better with the dead #ha live
Than it is with the liMng who die daily.

Oh Life, thou art a house wherein Fears inhabit^

JOURNAL [Age 23

And when Man, poor pilgrim, enters the doors,
They flock unto him with icy hands.

They lead him in their shivering company,

And if he come to a shining room.

They tell him it leads to a dungeon tower.

SONG

This cup of life is not so shallow
That we have drained the best.

That all the wine at once we swallow.

And lees make all the rest.

Maids of as soft a bloom shall marry
As Hymen yet hath blessed,

And finer forms are in the quarry •

Than Phidias e’er released.

[Tlve damps of Autumn brought increase to
Emerson’s symptoms. The invitations to preach
which came to him were gratifying, but after
each occasion his chest felt tke sfrain. His co»i-
dition was low ; consumption distinctly threat-
ened him. At this crisis his good (half-) uncle,
Reverent} Samuel R\prey, came to the rescue and
insisted on Ijis going South for the winter and
there remaining unviP his health improved;
and he advanced the necessary filnds and gave
letters of credit. TJiere can be little doubt that

1826] SOUTHWARD VOYAGE 133

Emerson’s life was saved by Mr. Ripley’s kindly
forethought and generosity. Waldo stayed at
home until h^ couid see his loved brother
Edward, just returned from France, and tjien
took ship for Charleston, South Carolina, on
the 25th of* November.]

(From “ XVI,” Cabot’s S)

For versattlity of Genius, see Livy, de Cato
the Elder; Shakspeare, de Henry V, — “ Hear
him debate of Commonwealth affairs,” etc., etc.;
Aubrey, de Bacon ; Byron, de Caesar ; Plutarch,
de Themi^tocles ; Milton, de Education; and
Stewart, Fred. Ill’s bottle in cellar; Jack of all
trades, good at none — W’^haf ’s worth doing,
worth doing well.

“No profit comes where is no pleasure talfen :

•In brief, sir, study what you most affect.”

N^ature notches the? edge of the petal, and hurls
the globes in orbits.

(From Cabot’s R)

At Sea; Sunday, hecember 3,* 1826.

’T is a nine days’ wo»d«r to me, this voyage
of mine. Here I have been rolling through the
weary leagues of salt water, musing much on

134 JOURNAL [Age 13

myself and on man, with some new but inco-
herent thinking. I revolved a thought I had'
somewhere found, that dangers' were compan-
ions of illustrious minds ; and applying it to
society^ which may, like individuals, by its edu-
cation and fortune emerge from obscurity and
grow illustrious, I perceived that in it.« progress
it would overtake dangers not known to its
infancy. It would embrace dangers and ennoble
itself by its company. The men of this age work
and play between steam-engines of tremendous
force, amid the roaring wheels of manufactories,
brave the incalculable forces of the storm, here
in the seat of its sovereignty, and fulfil in these
perilous crises all the minute offices of life, as
calm and unawed as they would compose them-
selves to sleep in the shade of a forest. Such
facts assert a sovereignty in the mind that is
very dear to the philanthropist.

After a day or two, I found i- could live os
comfortably in this tent, tossed<,on the ocean, as
if it were pitched on the mountains ashore. But
it is the irresistible se'ntimfcnt of the first day,
whilst your philosophy is sea-sick, to fancy man
is violating the order, of nature in coming out
here where he assuredly has no business ; and
that, in virtue of this trespass on his part, the

INERTIA

i8z6]

*35

wind has a right to his canvass and the shark
to his body. Whilst his philosophy is distem-
pered, so is hfe im^ination. The whole music
of the sea is desolate and monitory. The lyave
and the cloud and the wind suggest power more
than beauty to the ear and eye. But the recovery
is rapid, .and the terrible soon subsides into the
sublime.

(From “ XVIII," 2d)

Charleston, South Carolina,

December 13 .

I have, for a fortnight past writ nothing. My
bosom’a lord sits somewhat drowsily on his
throne. It is because I think not at all that I
write not at all. There is to me something
alarming in these />er/Wj’ of mentality. Qne day
I ani a doctor, and the next 1 am a dunce, that
is, so far as relates to my own resources. An
educated mait who thinks for himself can, of
course, at any Wme, by contact with a powerful
mind, whether by conversation or by a book, be
easily wrought upo'n, arti^ go into action. But
put away these foreign impulses, and the mind
will be treacherous to*it 8 alleged immortality,
inasmuch as*suspchded action, independent of
the waking and sleep of the body, assaults the

136 JOURNAL [Age 23

notion of spiritual life. The true accovmt of the
scarecrow is this. At sea a fortnight elapses in ‘
which I always remember myself to have been,
in t'mes past, a channel through which flowed
bright ^nd lofty thought. But I find in me no
disp()sition, no power to recreate for*' myself the
same brilliant entertainment! I come to land,
and the weary days succeed each other as on
the desolate sea, but this coveted power does
not return, and every attempt to force the so>al
is heavily baffled. Now suppose it should never
return ; the causes are concealed, the sun and
the moon are hidden which affect the ebbs and
flowings of the intellectual tides.* They are
determined by sofnething out of me and higher
than me. If the virtue that is gone out of me
be withheld, I have parted with what in life
was best, and eternity will lose its dread a,ttrac-
tions. Eternity is only desirable when regarded
as the career of an inquisitive nfind. It woukd
be a disappointment, a prolongad sorrow to him
who mourned the loss of the sense which only
could unlock its treafures. Yet during the days
of this eclipse the notice of the loss of light

• C

1 Unsure the ebb and flow of thought :

• ' i

The mt>on comes back — the Spirit not.

See ( Appendix yThc Poet/^

,826] MORAL SENSE INBORN 137

•

sometimes rises into apprehension lest it might
?iot return. This is our boasted human dignity
and majesty and so forth. We are such bubbles
that when we mount, we see not how ; and when
we grow great, we cannot commend ourselves.

(From Cabot’s R)

t

Charleston, South Carolina,

December 16.

It is an old remark, that there are no discov-
eries in morals. It is the leading object of our ex-
istence, to form moral character, and the laws of
morals are therefore written on the heart in lumi-
nous and ineffaceable characters. . . . But there
are problems of moral science,* questions of no
easy solution, and it would be the grossest error
to suppose that from the scanty lights of nature
the young and ignorant were equally competent
to decide them with the experienced moralist.

Jt cannot be» All men are equal on this point
precisely in the sense in which we say in general
all men are born free and equal. They all have
the same kind of moVal s(?iqpce in different de-
grees, and in each sufficient for hisjA’ants. The
little child refuses to tell « lie with the same con-
fidence in the*rectitftde of his refusal that the
archangel feels when he persists in his allegiance

138 JOURNAL [Age 23

to the most High, and defies the Tempter. But
the child can give no reaspn for his perceptiorf,
nor see one step beyond of its harmony with
Nature.

Bu/ there are discoveries in morals: i, in the
caap of every individual who loves'to search the
sources of action, the mann’er in which God has
connected and fortified us by the graduated forces
of the passions, — Tut, tell me h& makes no dis-
coveries, from the time he first blushed, to the
hour when he analyzed Shame; and 2, there are
discoveries made in morals from age to age. . . .
The silent progress of human refinpment does
from time to time disclose more and more in-
sight of the moral frame of man.

Understand now, morals do not change, but
the science oi morals does advance ; men discover
truth and relations of which they were before
ignorant ; therefore, there artf discoveriesi in
morals.

It is under this persuasion that we think it a
matter pf importance to adapt the exercises of
public worship to the changing exigences of
society. If ethics wei^ an immovable science,
the primeval altar of the' Jews' might serve as
the model of our holy place. . . .

1826] ADVANCING RELIGION 139

We see that we are standing on a higher stage ;
rtiat we are instructed^ by a better philosophy,
whose greater principles explain to us the design,
whilst they comprehend, themselves, the petty
provisions of the less. — We leave the ritual, the
offering, and the altar of Moses; w«cast off ^e
superstitions that were the swaddling clothes of
Christianity, the altercations of novices, the am-
bition that crAted a hierarchy, the images and
the^ confessional ; and would accommodate the
instructions of the Church to the wants of wor-
shippers. We already descry the broader light
blazing before us when we shall have emerged
from the porches of the temple and stand in the
temple itself. . . . Then the Champion of the
Cross will be able to turn from this ungrateful
task, in which ages haveso unprofitably elapsed,
of stripping off the manifold coats under which
prejudice and falsehood had concealed the truth
— iindcomeat last to the dear and lofty employ-
ment of pointings out the secret but affecting
passages in the history of the soul. . . .

1 1 has been ever a 'favofirfte topic of the pul-
pit to warn men against the great vice of every
day, — assuming the sh«w« of godliness when
their hearts are'strangtrs to its power, — no man
in the world but pretends to a more perfect vir-

140 JOURNAL [Age 23

«

tue than he possesses, — and to denounce against
this most prevalent sin the future vengeance o'f
heaven. I am inclined to consider this a very
imperfect statement, as so falling very far short of
the ppwer and conviction it ought to carry. In-
st^d of dsnouncing a future contingent ven-
geance, I see that vengeance to be contemporary
with the crime. Instead of a cold delineation of
the discord between hypocrisy knd just moral
feeling, I see the attempt at disguise, in every
instance, to fall shamefully short of its own ends.
I see that its plot is wise and its hands cunning,
but in all its purposes, betwixt the work and the
reward, comes in upon the evil doers a dark and
strong hand which turns them back with shame
upon the way they came. The true statement
which I would introduce . . . is that the assump-
tion of a shew of virtue does not and cannot
impose on men, and that a successful hypocrisy
does not exist, and quiet natures suffer mos*' in
the apprehension of pain.

[strife 07 TriEOI-OGIANs]

It has been remarked that notwithstanding the
prodigious impressfoi? which theological conrro-
versies respecting the natureof Jesus Christ have
made on human history, and the passions they

,8*6] CLIMATE AND MANNERS 141

•

daily excite in men’s minds, the real difference be-
tween the sentiments the disputants when rig-
idly analyzed is very subtle, and is inconsiderable.
For the Trinitarian, whilst he names the nam^of
God, is very careful to separate the idea 0/ God
from his account of the life of Jesu» Christ, but
considers him only m his human nature; consid-
ers him as a man. Hence it happens well that, to
whatever part^ names education or inclination
has attached us, we sympathize all on the same
affecting views of the life and passion of our
Lord.

MANNERS

Manners seem to be more closely under the
influence of climate. They belong more to the
body than the soul, and so come under the influ-
ence of the sun; they are accommodations«of the
motions of the body to moods of the mind. In
Lapland, men are savage: in Norway, they are
pkwn-spoken atfd use no ceremony, in England,
some; in France, ^nuch ; in Spain, more. In like
manner, no man has travelled in the United
States from the Nortfi to th^ South without ob-
serving the change and ameliorationjaf manners.
In this city, it is most oble^vable, the use of the
conventions ofaddress among the lowest classes,
which are coarsely neglected by the labouring

142 JOURNAL [Acs *3

classes at the North. Two negroes recognize each
other in the street, thouglj both in rags, and both,,
it may be, balancing a burden on their heads,
wjth the same graduated advances of salutation
that jvell-bred men who are strangers to each
o^Jier would use in Boston. They do not part
before they have shaken haAds and bid good-bye
with an inclination of the head. There is a grace
and perfection too about these Courtesies which
could not be imitated by a Northern labourer
where he designed to be extremely civil. Indeed
I have never seen an awkward Carolinian.

Authors or Books quoted or referred to
IN Journals of 1825 and 1826

Bible ;

Horner; Socrates ; Plato ; Demosthenes ; Epi-
curus ; .

Plutarch; Seneca; Juvenal; Marcus Antoni-
nus; Origen;

* Machiavelli ; Luther; Montaigne;

Bacon; Shakspeare; Ben Jonson, Alchy-
mist ;

Milton ; ^Pascal, Pensees; Dryden, Song for
St. Cecilia s Dayy Absdom and Achitopbel ;

Newton; Burnet; Prideaux; Fontenelle; Le-
clerc;

1 8*6] READING 143

Le Saurin ; Pope ; Butler, Analogy; Voltaire;

Johnsoh, Lives of^^the Poets ; Hume, Essays ;
Vattel ; Rousseau, Emile; Buffon, Natural His-
tory; Warton, Essay on Pope; Speecjpes ;

Gibbon, Roman Empire ; Eichhorn ; Paley, Nat-
ural Theology ;

Mitfond, History of Greece; Herder; Playfair;
Dugald Stewart ; Jeffrey ; Mackintosh ; Thomas
Brown, Lectures on the Philosophy of the Human
Afind;

Napoleon ; De Stael, Germany ; Scott; Words-
worth, Excursion^ Intimations of Immortality^
Dion ; ,

Byron, Marino Faliero ; Campbell, The Last
Man;

Dr. Channing ; Edward Everett, Phi Beta
Kappa Oration; Webster, Funeral Oration on
Adams and Jefferson ;

Sampson Reed, Growth of the Mind,

JOURNAL XVIII

1827

[From “XVIII,” zd, Cabot’s Q and R, ahd a Pocket
Note-book]

(From Cabot’s R)

Charleston, S. C.
January 4, 1827.

A NEW year has opened its bitter, cold eye
upon me, here where 1 sought warm weather.
A new year has opened on me and found my
best hopes set aside, my projects all suspended.
A new, year has found me perchance no more
fit to live and no more fit to die than thp last.
But the eye of the mind has at least grown
richer in its hoard of observations. It has dc-
tec*ted some more of the darklir*ig lines that con-
nect past events to the present, and the present
to the future; that n^nlinheeded, uncommented,
in a thousand mazes wherever society subsists,
and are the moral cords of men by which the
Deity is manifested to the vigilant, br, more truly,
to the illuminated observer. It docs not always

PRINCIPLE

1827]

H5

— this gifted observation — it does not always
'presuppose a regulatfd soul. A man may be a
shrewd judge of the finest shades of character,
whose own conscience is contaminated with
habitual guilt. But such a man is not blind to
the discrepancy betwixt his morals atid his mind.
He perceives the discord, and cannot perceive
it without alarm. For he has an instinctive
dread of the tendencies to harmony in the Uni-
verse which he has often observed, and which
betoken some future violence to root out this
disorder. If the string cannot be made to ac-
cord, it myst be broken.

It is a just thought which was lately presented
to me and which fell in entirely with my own
notions of compensation, not yet fully unfolded,
that it is beyond the compass of the mosi'subtle
policy, when once the consideration of princi-
ple has been set aside, to regulate affairs so as
ak/avs to succeAl; or, (as in the instance on which
the remark was grounded) so as to keep for a
man the popularity for which his duty was
abandoned. For the order of Providence in the
world fights against such a man ; ani4 somewhere
on his way, maugre all his? forecast and all his
fetches, he wifi be unexpectedly circumvented
and thrown out.

146

JOURNAL

[Acs *3

NOTE-BOpKS

If an ingenious man lived long enough, he
might learn to talk by system, in a manner out
of all' comparison better than mep now use.
Suppose hirn to keep a book of commonplaces,
and, as his knowledge grew, to put* down on
the page of each the theories that occurred. It
is clear that in process of time it would embrace
all the ordinary subjects of human discourse. He
would n’t talk so well as those who have the
natural talent. Nature has fetches which art can-
not reach; bewitching felicities, affecting pauses,
that the mere practice of a moderat'e genius
would n’t attain. But something would doubt-
less be accomplished that would put to shame
the chtfap, extemporaneous draggle-tail dialogue
that takes place in our evening companies^ even
among men of letters and ambition, from candle-
light till the bell strikes nine ancT breaks up tfie
company.*

I Mr. Emerson’s own jr^ctice, from youth to age, ofkccp-
ing journals in which he, on the moment, faithfully recorded
his thought or oftservation or sentence, and made his corollary,
then or later, thereon, was the basis of all hjs writings, — the
poems, the lectures, the books, — and gave a strange interest
even to his occasional speech on public events.

,8*7] the single gift 147

Men lose their temper in defending their
taste.

A man becomes sensible, now and then, of
the existence of a kind of country gentlemen in
the regions of genius, a sort of taciturn crit’cs
who have jn them a solitary talent, it may be
a love of eloquence, an image enshrined in their
souls of eloquence so beautiful and so glorious
that the successful orator, if he could open the
doors of the mind and behold, would find his
satisfaction changed to admiration and move all
the springs of wonder, turn his summit of suc-
cess into a starting-post. Such a man seems to
belong elsewhere. He is a column in the desert,
e. g. R. M. G.’

It is the rare fortune of those who arc born
in thesfe times and this country to be born for
the blessing of the world.

There’s a frce*’masonry among the dull by
which they recognize and are sociable with the
dull, as surely as a correspovident tact in men
of genius.

1 Perhaps Robert Marion Gourdin, an attractive South-
erner, brother to John Ci. K. Gourdin, Emerson’s chum. He
studied medicine after leaving college.

148

JOURNAL

[Ace 23

THE FLAG

r. _

It is surprising what frivolous things excite
oijr strongest emotions. An old rag of blue and
red bunting — the national flag waving in the
aiji. of thesfr outposts of society — makes all my
patriotism glow again.'

IRON

«

It was formerly said that he " who has the most
iron will be master ofallthis gold.” In our times,
War has surrendered his supremacy to Trade.
But the experience of nations has shewn that the
manufacture of iron is an unerring Kidex of the
degree of civilization. The consequence is that
the position of Solon is still emphatically true,
though in a sense very wide of that which was
in hi^mind, that he who has most iron will have
all the gold.

1 Probably the flag on the old fdrt at Augustine, Florida.

T?ic cold at Charleston had driven him farther South. He had

/

written to his brother William, 1 am not sick, but liikc-sick.
I have but a single complaint, a certain stricture on the right
side of my chest which (always makes itself felt when the air
is cold or dam}), and exertion of the lungs is followed by an ach-
ing. The worst part of \k is<,thc deferring of hopes; and who
can help being heart-sick ?

THE EXILE

1827]

149

In your charity, the merit is always commen-
surate with the sacrif^(»e.

ST. AUGUSTINE

For fifteen ^winter days
1 sailed upon the deep, and turned my b*!ack
Upon the Northern lights, and burning Bear,*

And the cold orbs that hang by them in heaven,

Till, star by sta?, they sank into the sea.

Full swelled the sail before the driving wind.

Till the stout pilot turned his prow to land,

Where peered, 'mid orange-groves and citron blooms,
The little city of Saint Augustine.

Slow slid the vessel to the fragrant shore,

Loitering along Matanzas’ sunny )^’aves.

And under Anastasia’s verdant isle.

I saw Saint Mark’s grim bastions, piles of stone
Planting their deep foundations in the sea,

And sjfeaking to the eye a thousand things
Of Spain, a thousand ^heavy histories.

^^tider these bleached walls of old renown
Our ship was nu)Oi\xi.

An hour of busy noise,

And I was made a quiift citizen
Pacing my chamber in a Spanish street.

An exile’s bread is salt, his is sad,* —

I Another form ot the third line was,

On the twin Reart, fast tethered to the Pole.

150 JOURNAL [Age 23

t

Happy, he saith, the eye that never saw
The smoke ascending from a stranger’s fire !

Yet much is here

That can beguile the months of banishment
To the pale travellers whom Disease hath sent
Hither for genial air from Northern homes.

Oh, many a tragic story may be read, —

Dim vestiges of a romantic past.

Within the small peninsula of sand.

Here is the old land of America

And in this sea-girt nook, the infant steps,

First foot-prints of that Genius giant-grown
That daunts the nations with his power to-day.
Inquisitive of such, I walk alone
Along the narrow streets unpaved and old.

Among few dwellers, and the jealous doors
And windows barred upon the public way.

I explored

The castle and the ruined monastery,

Unpeopled town, ruins of streets of stone.

Pillars upon the margin of the fca.

With worn inscriptions oft explored in vain.

Then with a keener scrutiny, I marked
The motley population. Hither come
The forest families, timid and tame ;

Not now, as ^nce with stained tomahawk
The restless red man left^his council fire,

Or when, with Mexiquc art, he painted haughtily
On canvas woven in his boundless woods

ST. AUGUSTINE

1827]

151

His simple symbols for his foes to read.

Not such an one is yon ^oor vagabond,

Who in unclean *id sloven apathy
Brings venison from the forest, — silly trade.

Alas ! red men are few, red men are feeble.

They arc few. and feeble and must pass away.

And here,

The dark Minorcan, sad and separate.

Wrapt in his cloak, strolls with unsocial eye;

By day, basks idle in the sun, then seeks his food
All.night upon the waters, stilly plying
His hook and line in all the moonlit bays.

Here steals the sick man with uncertain gait,

Looks with^a feeble spirit at things around
As if he sighing said, What is ^t to me ?

I dwell afar ; — far from this cheerfess fen
My wife, my children strain their eyes to me,

And Oh ! in vain. Wo, wo is me ! I feel

In spite of hope, these wishful eyes no more

Shall sefc New England’s wood-crowned hills again.*’

• , • . ....

Heard the roanng on the beach long bcfofc
we saw land, and the sea was full of green twigs
and feathers.

(P'rom Pocket Not?-book)

St. Augustine,, 1*6, 1827.

The colonies observe the customs of the par-
ent country, however ill they may be adapted to

152 JOURNAL [Age 23

the new territory. The Dutch cut canals in
Batavia, because they cut .anals in Holland, but
the fierce sun of the E. Indies stagnated the water
and slew the Dutch. In like manner the Span-
iards and the Yankees dig cellars here because
there are cellars in Madrid and Boston; but the
water fills the cellars and makes them useless
and the house unhealthy. Yet still they dig
cellars. Why? Because there are cellars in
Madrid and Boston.

Over the gate of the Fort is an inscription
which, being in Spanish, and in an abbreviated
character, I was unable to read. Aft'r many in-
quiries in town, I could not find an individual
who had ever read it, or knew anything about
it. Mr. Gay, the public interpreter, took the card
on which I had written what letters were not de-
faced of the inscription, and succeeded in decy-
phering the following record : —

^Regnando en Espana el Semr Don Fernarl''
Gobernador y Capitan General de esla plaza de
San Agostino de la Florida y su provincia el Ma-
riscal de Campo Don Alonzo Fernandes d’ Heredia
se concluio e^te castillo el aTio de dirigiendo
las obras el Capitan yhclniero Don Pedro de Brozas
y Garay.

Which runs in English thus : —

ST. AUGUSTINE

1827]

*53

“ Don Ferdinand VI being king of Spain, and
the Field Marshal D9 «j Alonzo Fernandez d’ He-
redia beingGovernor and Captain General of this
place of St. Augustine of Florida, and of its pro-
vince, this fort was finished in the year 1756# The
works were directed by the Captain Fligineer Dt)n
Pedro de Brozas y Garay.”

It is commonly said here that the fort is more
than a century old. It seems there was an old
onp of much earlier date standing on the same
site, which was the foundation of the present
erection.

There gre two graveyards in St. Augustine,
one of the Catholics, another of the Protestants.
Of the latter, the whole fence is gone, having
been purloined by these idle people for firewood.
Of the former, the fence has been blowrwdown
by soijie gale, but not a stick or board has been
removed, — and they rot undisturbed ; such is
Xbe superstition* of the thieves. I saw two Span-
iards entering fhfe enclosure, and observed that
they took off their hats in reverence to what is
holy ground. In the Protes*tajityard, among other
specimens of the Sepulchral Muse,^the follow-
ing epitaph is written ovea the body of Mr. Hap-
poldt, “a natiVe of Germany”; —

154 JOURNAL [Age *3

Rest in this tomb, raised at thy children’s cost ;

Here sadly summoned wh^.t they had and lost

For kind and true, a treasure each alone,

A father, brother, and a friend in one ;

O happy soul, if thou canst see from high

,Thy large and orphan family.

[St. Augustine is the] oldest towij of Euro-
peans in North America; 1564; full of ruins, —
chimneyless houses, la/y people '; horsekeeping
intolerably dear, and bad milk from swamp grass,
because all the hay comes from the north. 4o(?)
miles from here is nevertheless the richest crop
of grass growing untouched. Why? because
there is no scythe in St. Augustine, and if there
were, no man who knows how to use one.

[determination of right]

(From Cabot’s R)

It occurs to me in reading the history of the
Revolution of 1688, that where, as in thatcas:,
the Providence of God and the progress of man-
kind imperiously demand the final success of a
cause, the particulsr events on which it might
be beforehand supposed the general result would
hang are disastrous, and yet without affecting
that general result. A determined bias is given
to the mass, which is preserved amid all the lesser

ACHILLE MURAT

1827]

155

revolutions which it fulfils, by the foreign at-
*tractions to which it|is subjected in its average
orbit. James gains the victories, but William
gains the crown. It is the same with the Ameri-
can Revolution.

[In th§ expression of doubts in the latter part
of the following entry, and perhaps in some
allusions latdl-, there seem to appear reflections
of the writer’s conversation with a new and not-
able friend. At St. Augustine he met Napoleon
Achille Murat, eldest son of Joachim Murat,
Napoleon’s brilliant cavalry leader, to whom he
gave his sister Carolineas wife, and made him king
of Naples. But for the overthrow of his uncle
the Kmperor, and the tragic death of his father.
Prince Achille Murat might have snccegded to
that troublesome kingdom. Happily he sought
his fortunes in the New World and became an
» enthusiastic A<nencan. He had married a Vir-
ginian lady,* a grand-niece of Washington, ind
was a planter near Tallahassee.

Emerson by chailce m%t^ Murat, who was two
years the elder, and the young men were drawn
to one another. Murat, brave, frank and friendly,

I A Mrs. Gray^ a widow of sixteen, ncc Catherine Willis,
Her father. Colonel Byrd Willis, lived near Frcdcricbburg*

156 JOURNAL [Acs 23

had a very active mind, but was skeptical as to
religious dogmas. Emancipated from the Church
of Rome, he was disgusted witn the low forms
of the Methodist and Baptist worship that he
foun^J in the new community. Emerson, of
ca:irse, was .much disturbed at the frank agnos-
ticism of this admirable youth, and gave him his
first ideas of the liberal and humane views of
the Channing Unitarians. The lesult of their
discussions appears in a letter from Murat,
which will be given a little later, also in the
references to Boston and the Unitarians in
Murat’s intelligent and enthusiastic letters on
“America and the Americans” to a. friend in
Belgium, which were published in translation
in a little book so entitled, after Murat’s death

in 184,7-]

[dark hours]

'St.. Augustine.

“A child in a vessel thinks tVe shores remove
when the ship leaves the shore. When the
affections depart from God, God appears to
depart from the soul. His image fades fast from
his sanctuary and whei?. he ceases to be seen he
is thought to cease to be.

There is a tremendous sympathy to which

,827] RIGHTS OF CONSCIENCE 157

we were born by which we do easily enter into
*the feelings of evil agents, of deep offenders in
the hour of their temptation and their fall. We
catch with intelligent ear the parley between, the
tempter and the tempted ; we measure wij^h sad
alacrity the’joys of guilt.

This is, a part of our condition, a part of our
free agency, and necessary to us as moral pro-
bationers. Let us, then, since it lies in our power,
observe these gradations by which he that stands
in his purity suffers himself to decline to his fall.

What hinders me from doing my will ? I am
perplexing myself with scruples that never en-
tered the.minds of thousands of persons, fellow-
beings of mine who have lived ^nd acted in simi-
lar circumstances. Why should I embarrass my
existence? voluntarily give up this enjoyment
of life, which is equivalent to so much life itself,
because of certain ideas, certain imaginations
,v^hich occur to nobody else, or, if they occur, are
defied? Who caWs on me to be the solitary ser-
vant, or the victim rather, of what is called Con-
science, when all my iteighRours are absolved from
its authority. Conscience, Virtue — to be sure
these are words of wonderful efficiency, but there
have been mdn who h.ave denied their founda-
tion in the nature of man. Yet these are the al-

158 JOURNAL [Age 23

pha and omega of the argument, these two words
are all the obstacles that sta» d between me and my'
advantage. They seem to me of some account, I
am accustomed to revere them. I honour men
that Jjonour them. Yet there are many preju-
diaes which I well remember to have influenced
my conduct when a child, which I nqw despise
and ridicule. These too may be but superstition,
and a few years hence I shall wondfcr that I could
ever be so pusillanimous as to regard them. Be-
sides, what am I in the general system of being
but an iota, an unregarded speck? Why then
suppose that my puny arm is chained, to one or
another action by all this apparatus of invisible
agency, that ail nry solitudes are swarming with
commissioned witnesses, that every word I utter
is overjieard, that every thought I entertain is
observed, that every insignificant passage of my
life is brought into judgment ? Alas! I fear me
there is something fabulous’ in this prodigious
array of solemn images with wiiich divines and
philosophers would bear me down and persuade
me that the health of this wide universe of moral
beings of an extent that afl'rights the imagina-
tion — and tfie Omnipotence of God over all —
arc nearly concerned in this pitiful contingency
(of mine) whether I shall act, or whether I shall

DOUBTS

1827]

»59

•

forbear. Why, this is the very folly of the dotard,
who thinks when a.;^assing hurricane darkens a
few leagues around his hovel, that the consumma-
tion of the world is come, whilst half the glob? be-
side is basking in sunshine. I am wiser thaji this.
I better rate my just value in the ^vorld. I tan
fulfil my .purposed without being affrighted by
these disproportion ed bugbears.

And what^s the amount of all that is called
rdigion in the world? Who is he that has seen
God of whom so much is known, or where is one
that has risen from the dead ? Satisfy me beyond
the possii>ility of doubt of the certainty of all
that is told me concerning the other world, and
I will fulfil the conditions oii which my salva-
tion is suspended. I'he believer tells me he has
an evidence, historical and internal, v hich make
the presumption so strong that it is almost a
certainty, that it rests on the highest of proba-
bilities. Yes; but change that imperfect to per-
fect evidence, afid I too will be a Christian. 6ut
now it must be admitted 1 am not certain that
any of these things are tru^ The nature of God
may be different from what is rejjresented. 1
never beheld him. 1 do«iot know that he exists.
This good wliich invites me now is visible and
specific. I will at least embrace it this time by

i6o JOURNAL [Age 23

way of experiment, and if it is wrong, certainly
God can in some mann^t signify his will in
future. Moreover I will guard against any evil
consequences resulting to others by the vigilance
with which I conceal it. . . .

4

J’anuary 3Q, 1827.

But now comes the analysis of this shallow
philosophy. He that was sinless f)efore declines
from his integrity. He says, I have sinned ; But
1 live; I am in health; I shall not sin again; and
how am I the worse ? and no man shall know it.
Vain, blind man! alas! the laws .which he
spurned, the laws of the moral Universe have
taken hold on him and assert their insulted su-
premacy. He thought himself too insignificant
to provoke the animadversion of the Most High
and that he might sin unnoticed in the immen-
sity of God’s government. But (lod has not so
poorly framed the economy of histadniinistratioB»
He devised no fallible police, nd contingent com-
pensations. Hesecured the execution of his ever-
lasting laws by committing to every moral being
the supervision of its own character, by mak-
ing every moral being the unrelenting, inex-
orable punisher of its own delinquency. In the
hour when he sinned, that hour his own fate

THE MURATS

i6i

1827]

avenged on him the majesty of the laws he had

broken. ,

(From Pocket Note-book)

TALLAHASSEE

Tallahassee, a grotesque place, Siplected three
years since as a suitable spot for the Capital of
the territory, and since that day rapidly settled
by public officers, land speculators and despera-
does. Much club law and little other. What are
called the ladies of the place are, in number, eight.
“Gov. Duval is the button on which all things
are hung.” Prince Murat has married a Mrs.
Gray and has sat down in the new settlement.
Tallahassee is 200 miles west*of St. Augustine,
and in the journey thither you sleep three nights
under the pine trees. The land in its »ieighbour-
hood is rich. Here is the township of Lafayette.

I saw here a marble copy of Canova’s bust
of Queen Carqjine* of Naples, Murat’s wife. It
did not strike ine as at all wonderful, thod^h
Canova’s busts of the Buonapartes are said to
be his finest works. ^

I ft would appear from this p.is5agc, although there is no
other mention of it, th.U Kmejj^op accepted an invitation of
Murat to ride witbhim to the new settlements in West Florida.
I was told in Tallahassee that Murat’s plantation was at some
distance to the eastw'ard from that small capital with its beau-
tiful surroundings.

i 62 journal [Ace *3

[In a letter written to his brother Charles, Jan-
uary 27 , Mr. Emerson saM: “ Whoso is in St.
Augustine resembles what may be also seen at
St. Augustine — the barnacles on a ledge of rocks
which the tide has deserted : move they cannot;
ve'ry uncomfortable they surely are ; but they can
hear from afar the roaring of the waters and im-
agine the joy of the barnacles that are bathed
thereby. The entertainments of the place are two,
billiards and the sea-beach, but those whose cloth
abhors the billiards — why, theirs is the sea-
beach. A small, gray-coated gnat is wagoner to
the queen of fairies, and we who walk on the
beach are seers of prodigious events and prophets
of noble natures.”

To William he wrote, a day or two later:
“ The»air and sky of this ancient, fortified, dilap-
idated sand-bank of a town are really delicious.
I am very decidedly relieved from my stricture,
wjiich seems to hold its tenure from Boreas. It
is a queer place. There are ‘eleven or twelve
hundred people, and these are invalids, public
officers, and Spaniards, or rather Minorcans.
What is dQne here? Nothing. ... 1 stroll on
the sea-beach and dfi^^ a green orange over the
sand with a stick. Sometimes I sail in a boat,
sometimes 1 sit in a chair. I read and write a

SEMINOLES

1827]

163

little, moulding sermons for an hour which may
never arrive. F or, thojigh there may be preaching
in the world to come, yet ... it will be hardly
after the written fashion of this pragmatic world.”
(See letters, of greater length, in Cabot’s Ale-
moir, vol. i.) ]

(From Pocket Note-book)

The Minort-'ans are very much afraid of the
Indians, All the old houses have very strong
walls and doors, with apertures through which a
musket can be discharged. They are delighted
to find that under the American flag the Indians
are afraid gf the whites. Some of them, however,
do not like to venture far out of the town at this
day. “ But what are you afraid of? Don’t you
know General Jackson conquered all "hejndi-
ans?” “ Yes, but General Jackens no here now.”
“But his son is, for, you know the Indians call
Colonel Gaddet^ his son.” “Ay, ay, but then
the Indians, for ^11 that.”

I saw by the city gates twq iron frames, in the
shape of a mummy, with iron rings tyi the head.
They were cases in which*the Spanish governor
had hung criminals upon a gibbet. There is a
little iron loop on one side, by the breast, in

164 JOURNAL [Age 23

which a loaf of bread and a vessel of water
were contained. Thus prl>vided, the wretch was
hung up by suspending the ring over his head to
a tree and left to starve to death. They were
lately dug up full of bones.

(From Cabot’s R)

h

PECULIARITIES OF THE PRESENT AGE

1. Instead of systematic pursuit of science,
men cultivate the knowledge of anecdotes.

2. It is said to be the age of the first person
singular.

3. The reform of the Reformation.

4. Transcendentalism. Metaphysics and
Fithics look inwards — and France produces
Mad. de Staiil ; Fingland, Wordsworth ; America,
Sampson Reed; as well as Germany, Sweden-
borg. . . .

5. The immense extent of the F.nglish lan-
guage and influence. The I'inglish tongue is
spreading over all North America except Mex-
ico, over Demerary, &c., Jamaica, &c., Indostan,
New Holland and the Australian islands.

6 . The/ paper currency. Joint stock compa-
nies.

7. The disposition among men of associating
themselves to promote any purpose. (Millions
of societies.)

,827] GENIUS AND VIRTUE 165

«

“ I have seen,” said a preacher, in Northamp-
*ton, “a drunkard why acknowledged his fault, a
profane man wTho confessed profanity, a loose
man who owned his licentiousness, &c., byt I
never saw an ungrateful man who owned his in-
gratitude. An ungrateful man ! A monster in the
universe.”

The argum*ent for Necessity can never be got
the better of. It is like a goose which, — fight it
down as much as you will, — always cackles of
victory. It always turned on you as you retired.
So of Berkeley’s Idealism.

•

There is hope of one who ha's a vein of genius
that he will be a friend to virtue. For there is
between virtue and genius a natural, ui «ternal
affinity, and where one is found, the other may
be looked for, as in South America a gold mine
is said to indicate the vicinity of diamonds.

The bodies of intemperate men are the tombs
of immortal minds. *

St.. Augustin^ February 2, 1827.

With a little thinking, passive almost amidst
our sensations, and rounding our lives with a

1 66 JOURNAL [Age 23

little sleep, we count off pur days with a prodi-
gal hand. The months di-part, and soon I shall
measure back my way to my own people. But
I feel how scanty is the addition I have made to
my knowledge or my virtue. Day by day I as-
sociate with men to whom my society yields no
noticeable amount of advantage or pleasure. I
have heard of heights of virtue and lives of
philanthropy. I am cold and solitary, and lead a
life comfortable to myself and useless to others.
Yet I believe myself to be a moral agent of
an indestructible nature, and designed to stand
in sublime relations to God and to„ my fellow
men; to contribute in my proper enjoyments to
the general welfare. What then, young pilot, who
by chart and compass pointest out to others the
shoals they must shun and the haven they must
seek — art not thyself a castaway ? Will you say
you have no call to more austere virtue than you
daily exhibit? Have you computed the moral
influences of this quiescence, tfnis waking torpor
of the soul and found them adequate to what
may in equity be .demanded of you? Young
pilot ! you^dare not say Aye.

1827] WAY OF THE GREAT 167

t 16 February i 1827.

My weight is 141 lbs.

It is not these speculations which are most
abstruse that either deserve or receive the best
reward from fame. The only dispensers of>fame
are the middle class of mankind, a'ld they will
not value, the far-sbught abstraction, no matter
how inaccessible or sublime, more than the fowl
on the dunghill regards the pearl. It came from
diiJtant climes, it was got with toil, it was hoarded
with care, yet having no suitableness to the wants
of the finder, is less valued than a kernel of corn.
Butthose.writings which indicate valuable genius
treat of common things. Those minds which
God has formed for any powerful influence over
men, have never effeminately shrunk from in-
tercourse with unnurtured minds. Th« y scorned
to be tender and squeamish. Human destiny is
not nice. They have taken hold with manly hand
on its vulgar \Mjints; on poverty and riches; on
pain of body and pain of mind, on the incon-
veniences of goodness, and the compensating
hope. “Most poor mattery point to rich ends.”
Besides the advantage of being unt^erstood, it is
a groundless fear that the author loses a jot of
true dignity by this humility in the choice of
topics ; for the high and low points of human

l68 JOURNAL [Age 23

t

life are so nearly allied tliRt no man of powerful
sense ever found himself oji any subject far re-
moved from the sources of what is deeper in hu-
man thought. It is a near neighbourhood, that
of gnsatness of destiny and lowness of lot ; that
of mind and matter; that of man and God. It
is like our natural existence. 'Though^we be pig-
mies of a few feet, it is not a dungeon wall which
confines us to the earth. There is nothing be-
tween us and the infinite Universe. So our life,
which had its beginning a few summers ago from
a sorry succession of some dull material causes,
walks with God on the other side through time
and chance, through the fail ofsuns and systems,
through unbounded ages, unhurt and immortal.
’T is the rich treasure in earthen vessels. Such
being *the character of our life, such must also be
the character of its descriptions.

If a man carefully examine feis thoughts he
will be surprised to find how Aiuch he lives in
the future. His well being is always ahead. Such
a creature is probal:\ly imrriortal.

(From Ppcjfct Note-book) ,

The worthy father of the Catholic church here.

PRIEST— INDIANS

1827]

169

by whose conversation I was not a little scandal-
ized, has lately been arrested for debt and im-
prisoned in St. Mark’s. This exemplary divine
on the evening of his arrest said to Mr. Crosby,
“ If you can change ten dollars for me, P will
pay you the four which I owe you.” Crosby gave
him six, w,hich the* father put in his waistcoat
pocket, and, being presently questioned, stoutly
denied that he had anything from him. But Crosby
was the biggest and compelled him to restore the
money. I went yesterday to the Cathedral, full
of great coarse toys, and heard this priest say
mass, for Ijis creditors have been indulgent and
released him for the present.

I met some Indians in the street selling veni-
son. I asked the man where he lived? ‘^Yon-
der.” “Where?” “ In thebig swamp.” He sold
his haunch for 5 bks. The purchaser offered
him one bit, and a bill worth half a dollar an^
counted on his Angers this, one^ and this,/<?//r.
“You lie,” said the Indian — which I found
was his only word for no. 1 gave him a half bit
for “ piccaniny.” I ndian notions abo\jt the Crea-
tion, and tbree^ pairs, and»three boxes.

Col. Humphreys [is] Indian Agent.

lyo JOURNAL [Age 23

(From “XVlfl” 2d)

TO HIS BROTHER EDWARD

February, 1827.

Much of what we learn, and to the highest
purposes, of life is caught in moments, and rather
by a sublime instinct than by modes which can
be explained in detail. I acquire, when musing
on my office and my hopes, notions which might
savour of enthusiasm to an unprepared ear. .If
any unlucky Charles light on these sentences
and call them obscure, tell him with Pindar, “ It
sounds to the intelligent.”

TO HIj BROTHER CHARLES

23 February, 1827.

Ho'w is it with the ambitious youth ? he of
the sometime melancholy temperament, he that
was called ardent, eloquent, irresistible scholar;
he who loved greatness, and def/ed fair women ;
he who adored virtue on the great scale, but was
squeamish at viewing it on a small one ; he who
had enthusiasm from nature, but it was almost
all evapora!/^d in the kneading ; he whose taste
would be correct, wete it more magly, and whose
form would be good, were it more stout — thy-
self? I am prone to mercy, and would draw

1827] LETTER TO CHARLES 171

your character to the ^ife, so that your own eye
should acknowledge tne fidelity of the portrait-
ure. The memory is sharp, when home is dis-
tant and the dim congregation which my fancy
nightly and daily visits always appear in costOme,
each in his virtues and vices. ... *

You arejn the h'eyday of youth, when time
is measured not by numbering days, but by the
intervals of mentality, the flux and reflux of the
soul. One day has a solemn complexion, the
next is cheerful, the south wind makes a third
poetic, and another is “sickbed o’er with a pale
cast of thought,” — but all are redolent of know-
ledge and joy. The river of life with you is yet
in its mountain sources, bounding and spouting
o,n its way, and has not settled down into the
monotony of the deep and silent stream. Vouch-
safe, then, to give your poor brother some of
these sweet waters. Write, write. I have heard
men say (Heaven help their poor wits), they
would rather have ten words viva voce from a
man than volumes of letters to get at his opin-
ion. I had rather converse .with them by the
interpreter. I^oliteness ruins convers^ion. You
get nothing.but^the scum anchsurface of opinions,
when men are afraid of being unintelligible in
their metaphysical distinctions, or that the sub-

172 JOURNAL [Age 23

tlety and gravity of whatjthey want to say will
draw too largely on the extemporaneous atten-
tion of their company. Men’s spoken notions
are thus nothing but outlines, and for the most
part}, uninviting outlines of a subject, and so
general as to have no traits appropriate and pe-
culiar to the individual. Bui when a man writes,
he uncovers his soul, he divests himself of his
manners and all physical impertections, and it
is the pure intellect that speaks. I'here can, be
no deception here. You get the measure of his
soul. Instead of the old verse, “ Speak that I
may know thee,” I write, ‘ Speak that I may
suspect thee ; write that I may know thee.”
Take your pen therefore and give me the secret
history of the sanctuary you call yourself; what
new lights illuminate, what fragrant affections
perfume it; what litanies are sung; what works
are daily done in its industrious recesses, and to
what god is it consecrated ? Ar^;;]l if you have any
inclination to retort, and play’ the La Bruyere
on me, I defy you. It will give me extreme
pleasure to see yqp miss the mark, and more
if you hit ijt.

,827] DUST AND GRANDEUR 173

TO MIS^ EMERSON

February y 1827.

Pascal wrote to expose the contradictions ex-
isting in human nature, to show that itwa»vile
and sublime* and to furnish an account of the
extremes. Young also stated and discussed the
paradox. liut a competent account has not, in
my judgment,* been given. Every man of re^
flexion has felt a contiguity between what was
minute and what was magnificent, which was
never stated in words. There is not a thing so poor
and refuse in the world but that has some aspects
and connq^cions which are grand. The chaff on
the wind, the atom swimming In the sewer, fill
a place in the system of matter as essential as
the sun in heaven. And how, then, can rnan be
low ? If, on one side, his feet are in the dust, on
the other there is nothing between his head and
the infinite heavens!

Yea, yea, though I may fail to make it appar-
ent in language, I feel that close by meanness is
grandeur. In a beggfir’s xt'e^ds, in a servile of-
fice, the imagination starts out with a noble re-
coil, and in that moment\\dii«pers “Ye are gods.”
Never so lowly but we remember that we are ten-
ants of infinite spaces and survivors of the sun

174 JOURNAL [Age *3

0

and the stars.’ Power,” said Pythagoras,
“is never far from nec«sity,” a stern saying
which is both analogy and exemplification to
my homily.

What set me forth on this odd declamation
was the curious moral quality we call patriotism,
which seems to flourish best,* like flowers, in low-
est grounds. Wise men perceive that the ad-
vantage of the whole is best consulted in con-
sulting the real advantage of the particular, and
do not therefore dissipate their affection or their
force. But the dusty artisan who needs some
consolation for the insignificant figure his sordid
habits and feelings make in comparison with the
great, and in comparison with his own conscience
and conceptions, is fain to remember how large
and honourable is the confederacy of which he
is a member and, that, however low his lot, his
resources are yet reckoned an integral part of
that awful front which the nation presents to the
i^orld. Hence the unaffected, ooisterous enthu-
siasm with which any spirited allusion to the idea

r

I The above passage^ recalls Mr. Emerson verses begin-
ning ** Let go where’er I will ” Poems (Appendix), and
also the often quoted lincsnn' the P'oluntisriej

So nigh is grandeur to our dust,

$0 near ti God to man, etc.

,8*7] OFFICE OF CHRIST 175

■

of Country is always |eceived by a mixed assem-
bly. But it is not onjy plebeian clay that is thus
touched. The sciolists also.

. . You say the sermon on prayer wanted lyic-
tion and authority, and allusion to a venerable
name. Let me suggest that the Son of God, if
he listens from on high to the feeble efforts of
his mortal ministers, may more approve the piety
which finds th^original foundation of his Father’s
law complete and competent, than that which
adds awkward abutments to the work of Om-
niscience from the second dispensation. The true
account. Intake to be this. Men were so igno-
rant and besotted they could not see the perfec-
tion of morals. Jesus Christ w'as sent to remove
the blindness from their minds. They are now
able to see the majestic proportions and the
sufficiency of the first Law. And it needs no
corroboration.

(Fr^i Pocket Note-book)

St. Augustine, February 25.

I attended mass in Ihe Catholic Church. The
mass is in Latin and the sermon in English, and
the audience, who are Spaniards, understand
neither. The services have been recently inter-
rupted by the imprisonment of the (clergy-

176 JOURNAL [Age 23

man) worthy father for de?)t in the Castle of St
Marks.

The people call the place Botany Bay, and say
that -vhenever Presidents and Bishops or Pres-
byteries have danglers on their hands fit for no
offices they send them to Florida.

When the woods are burned ’tls said they set
the rivers in Florida on fire.

(From “XVIII,” 2d)

BIBLE

The Bible is an engine of education of the first
power. It does more than all other books. It
is an index everywhere of light. All over the
world where that book is found and honoured
there is light ; where it is not found there is dark-
ness. The Sabbath doth more for education
than all books and schools and. institutions be-
side, united. It is one seventh of the week. It
is one seventh of the year. It is one seventh
of life. The child t^at hath lived in the light
of no othe^ opportunity, at seven years has had
one year of education.* The man at threescore
years and ten has had ten years of religious edu-
cation.

1827] the slave auction 177

•

It is a sound docfjrine that faith is virtue. If
God sent revelations daily, none could plead the
merit of faith.

(From Pocket Note-hook)

St. Augustine, February 27.

A fortmght sinefe I attended a meeting of the
Bible Society. The Treasurer of this institution
is Marshal of* the district, and by a somewhat un-
fortunate arrangement had appointed a special
meeting of the Society, and a slave-auction, at the
same time and place, one being in the Government
house, anj] the other in the adjoining yard. One
ear therefore heard the glad tidings of great joy,
whilst the other was regaled with “Going, gentle-
men, going ! ” And almost without changing our
position we might aid in sending the Scr^Jtures
into Africa, or bid for " four children without the
mother ” who had been kidnapped therefrom. It
was singular en^ugk that, at the annual meeting
of this Society one week after, the business should
have been interrupted by an unexpected quarrel
of two gentlemen present* lyith, I believe, mem-
bers of the Society, who with langu^e not very
appropria^o»^tq the occasion collared each other,
and were, not without difficulty, separated by the
interference of some members. There is some-

lyS JOURNAL [Age 23

thing wonderfully piquantpn the manners of the
place, theological or civil. A.Mr. Jerry, a Metho-
dist minister, preached here two Sundays ago,
who confined himself in the afternoon to some
pretty intelligible strictures upon the character
of a President of the Bible Society who swears.
The gentleman alluded to was present. And it
really exceeded all power of face to be grave dur-
ing the divine’s very plain analysis of the mo-
tives which probably actuated the individual in
seeking the office which he holds. It fairly beat
the ** ^ousque, Catilina”

March 1.

I found here a gentleman from North Caro-
lina who gave me some account of the monstrous
absurdities of the Methodists at their Camp
Meetings in that State. He related an instance
of several of these fanatics jumping about on all
fours, imitating the barking of dogs and sur-
rounding a tree in which they pr “tended they had
“treed Jesus.”

(From Cabot’s R)

St. AuguStine, East Florida,

' March ii, 1827.

To believe too much is dangefous, because
it is the near neighbour of unbelief. Pantheism
leads to Atheism.

ST. AUGUSTINE

179

1827]

I am an exile from n^y home ; heavily
And all alone I walk the long seashore.

And find no joy. The trees, the bushes talk to me.
And the small fly that whispers in my ear.

Ah me ! I do not love the look
Of foreign men ;

And woe is me that I forsook
My lit;le home, my lamp, my book.

To find across the foaming seas
This cheerless fen.

I care not that it should be said
By lords and grooms
That nature in my land is dead
And snows are scattered on her head.

Whilst here the fig and citron shed
I'heir fragrant blooms.

And dulcimer mosquitoes in the woods
Hum their sly secrets in unwilling ears.

Which, like all gosjsip, leave a smart behind.

March 25th, Weighed 152 lbs.

TO MISS EMERSON
(From “ XVIII*” 2d)

St. AiJGU»ri'NE, Marcb^ 1827.

I fancy myself better lately, through the bless-
ing of God and the use of this fine air. And if

i8o JOURNAL [Agb 23

it please him that I shall ^holly recover, I agree
to the sentiment of your letter that I shall be a
wiser and better man. He has seen but half the
Universe who never has been shown the house
of Pain. Pleasure and Peace are but indifferent
teachers of what it is life to know. And though
the mind touched with poetiy must have a God,
and the heart will reveal one, if history does not,
yet the smooth man of taste and ease will be
satisfied with a very indistinct and shadowy per-
sonification mixing on every side with the un-
intelligent forms of nature — some spirit too
vague, if not too kind, to rebuke and punish his
sin and pride. But the decay of his hopes ; the
manifested inefficacy of efforts into which he has
pushed the pith and resources of all his nature;
suffering and the grievous dependence on other
men which suffering brings with it, — these things
startle the luxurious dreamer, and alarm him
with necessities never experienc|^d before. These
suggest the possibility of relations more inti-
mate and more awful than friendship and love.
They bring to light a system of feelings whose
existence was not suspected before ; they place
him in a connexion w’th God that furnishes a
solution of the mystery of his being.

Yet is the lesson of resignation hard to learn,

ST. AUGUSTINE

1827]

181

and I believe is seld9m taught the young. . . .
Tt is easier for the venerable saint, whose warfare
is accomplishe({ and whose brows are crowned, to
sing his hymn whilst the faggots are lighted, than
it is for a youth whose yet unmeasured pjawers
and yet imfnature virtues have alreapdy suggested
an unbounded confidence in himself; one for
whom thd soothsayer Hope

“Has turned the iron leaves of Fate’s dark book
To read high dooms ” —

These and such as these are, my dear Aunt,
the thoug/its of every young man whose projects
of life are menaced by disease. I have made the
case extreme, you see, and instead of painting
myself, have given you one better and brighter.
But if you complain of long words and trite
thoughts, I confess I am fair game.

(Ffom Cabot’s U)

[farewell to ST. Augustine]

There licst thou, little city of the deep,

And always hcarest the ij*iceasing sound
By day and night, in summer and yi frost.

The ro^ of waters on#thy coral shore.

But, softening southward in thy gentle clime.
Even the rude sea relents to clemency.

1 82 JOURNAL [Age *3

Feels the kind ray of that benignant sun
And pours warm billows up the beach of shells.
Farewell} and fair befall thee, gentle town !

The prayer of those who thank thee for their life,
The benison of those thy fragrant airs.

Arid simple hospitality hath blest,

Be to thee ever as the rich perfume
Of a good name, and pleasant memory !

EXTRACT FROM A LETTER TO WILLIAM

Charleston, April 23, 1827.
My dear Brother, —

I arrived here yesterday, after a direful pas-
sage of nine days from St. Augustine. 7’he ordi-
nary one is one or two days. We were becalmed,
tempest-tossed, and at last well nigh starved, but
the belpved brother bore it not only with equa-
nimity, but pleasure, for my kind genius had sent
me for my ship-mate Achille Murat, the eldest
son of theold King Joachim. Hew now a planter
at 'Tallahassee and at this time on his way to
visit his uncle [Joseph Bonaparte] at Borden-
town. He is a philosqpher, a scholar, a man of the
world ; very skeptical but very candid, and an
ardent lover of truth. 1,. blessed my f^^arsfor my
fine companion and we talked incessantly. Much
more of him when 1 shall see you.

i8*7] ACHILLE MURAT 183

(From Cabot’s R)

• Charleston, April 6, 1827.

A new event is added to the quiet history of
my life. I have connected myself by frier^ship
to a man who with as ardent a love 0/ truth as that
which animates me, with a mind surpassing mine
in the variety of its research, and sharpened and
strengthened* to an energy for action to which
I have no pretension, by advantages of birth and
pActical connexion with mankind beyond almost
all men in the world, — is, yet, that which I had
ever supposed only a creature of the imagination
— a consistent Atheist, — and a disbeliever in the
existence* and, of course, in the immortality of
the soul. My faith in these points is strong and
I trust, as I live, indestructible. Meantime I love
and honour this intrepid doubter. His soul is
noble, and his virtue, as the virtue of a Saddu-
cee •must always be^ is sublime.

(From ‘•XVIII,” 2d)

• •

TO MISS EMERSON

^ Charleston, to, 1827.
... I fancy myself wiser for my excursion.
To be sure, one need not stir from the chim-

184

JOURNAL

[Age 23

ney corner for that. . . . But I rake the bright
atoms faster together by quitting the fireside:
and sallying out after them, than by waiting for
them in the slow and uncertain communication
of Bqioks. Besides, to sluggish natures and man-
ners impolite, travelling is the best lesson.
When the man is at home, his standing in
society is well known and quietly taken; but
when he is abroad, it is problerr.atical, and is
dependent on the success of his manners. If
he can assume the part of a gentleman, he is
acknowledged as such. There is much enter-
tainment also in the business of ascertaining
the degree and character of a hundred casual
acquaintances, and observing how far your pre-
conceived notions tally with your experience of
any companion as he gradually discloses him-
self. For me, who, like all men of a religious
temper, love to consider myself as a favoured
child of the Divinity, who is* unrolling the Uni-
verse before me for my particular instruction ;
and, with an exact reference to my exigences
and state of preparation, i-s bringing into my
neighbourhood now*bne, and now another man,
agent or combination of agents, ui^til, by just
degrees I am strengthened in ekch immortal
fibre for the scenes of magnificent action which

1827] ACHILLE MURAT 185

r-

another world shall disclose for me, — it is very
pleasant to retire with these views into my shell,
and salute the comers as they pass in procession
with a very majestic indifference — much as I
would behold so many ingenious puppets 4»vhich
another ha*nd is guiding. Nevertheless, I shall
not deny that there are some who take such a
strong hofld of my attention that 1 am fain to
quit my stoi^ fur, and fairly go out of my circle
and shake hands and converse with them. Now
1 know, my kind Aunt with all her electrical
imagination, will think I am talking of women.
Alack-a-day! it surely is not so. Wo is me!
with all the chivalry that is in mv soul, backed
by all the muse, I pass in cold selfishness from
Maine to Florida and tremble lest I be destined
for a monk. No, I was speaking of mw, and
another time I will give you an account of one
whom it was my good fortune to meet in East
FloVida, a man^f s’plendid birth and proud ad-
vantages, but ^humble disciple in the school
of truth.

[As the foregoing is the last place but one
in the journal in whiclj Murat is mentioned,
and the friends never met again, it seems best
to say a last word about him here in connection

1 86 JOURNAL [Agb 23

%

with the letter he wrote to his Northern friend
in the autumn, here introduced,. Although the
young Murat is not mentioned by name in Mr.
Emerson’s works, their pleasant companionship
is th&s recalled in the essay “ Society and Soli-
tude ” in tfie volume of that name. “If we
recall the rare hours when vVe encountered the
best persons, we there found ourselves, and then
first society seemed to exist. That was society,
though in the transom of a brig, or on the
Florida Keys.”

Achille Murat went abroad a few years later,
and his military instincts led him to t^ke a com-
mission in a Belgian cavalry regimen/, but the
“ Holy Alliance did not approve of a brilliant
nephew of the dreaded Eimperor (who was said,
too, So have borne a strong resemblance to
his uncle) receiving a military training from a
friendly power bordering on France, and for
this reason the regiment is said^j have been dis-
banded. Murat then lived for a time in England,
he and his wife befriending Louis Napoleon, then
an impoverished excite, w*ho, when emperor,
showed his,, gratitude to his “Cousin Kate”
when she was a widow after the CivU War. The
Murats returned to their plantation in West
Florida, where they spent the rest of their lives.

1827] MURAT’S LETTER 187

Achille Murat, returning from the Old
World, with all its attractions, enjoyed keenly
plantation life with his brave wife in the fron-
tier territory. He served in the Seminole W^r.
An entertaining account of the Murats -'ap-
peared in Munsey s Magazine a few* years ago,
entitled “ An American Princess.” They were
childless. Prince Murat died in 1847. His re-
mains and thole of his wife lie in the graveyard
of Tallahassee.

As to his agnosticism, the widow of Governor
Long of Florida told me that her husband
was Murat’s second in a duel. As he took his
pistol he ^aid quietly, “You know 1 expect
nothing hereafter,” and stood up to give and
receive fire, which happily was without fatal
results to either combatant.]

LETTER FROM ACHILLE MURAT TO R. W.

EMERSON

Point Rreeze,* September 3, 1827.

My dear Sir, — I have received nearly one
month ago, your very polite letter, which I

1 Point Breeze, near Borden town, Ncwjeiiey,was the
home of Jo»cp|iMBonaparic who,« forced by his brother, the
Emperor, to be successively King of Naples and King of
Spain, was thankful to spend his later days in quiet in America,
In the letter the spelling of the original is preserved.

1 88 JOURNAL [Age aj

would have answered sooner but for my ill
health. I have not left my bed since the mid-
dle of July, and since three weeks I have been
afpicted with a Paralisis in my hands and arms
which prevents me using my pen. This, as you
may well think has entirely put a stop to my
plans, study and literary pursuits. I had here
lost sight of the discussions which We intended
to have together, but I intended ‘as well as your-
self to be able to continue it without interrup-
tion, before engageing in it. I must tell you,
however, candidly, that the state of my mind
has been altered since our meeting.^ Your sys-
tem has acquired as much in proberbility as
mine has lost "in certainty, both seem to me
now nearly equally proberable. I have accord-
ingly one only test left — that of expediency.
On this subject I still lean on my side, in a
refined state of society, although in barbarous
time of obscurity and ignorance your tlieory
may be more useful. A necessary prelimanary,
however, is to assertain how far we can have an
absolute notion o( truth." This is paramount to
all subsequent indigations. As soon as 1 shall
be home (about th^ beginning November)
and I shall be able to do anything, I shall em-
ploy myself in writing a monography of truth,

18*7] MURAT’S LETTER 189

for which I have been collecting materials, ahd
of which, I believe I have spoken to you. As
I shall not move from my house for a long
time, I shall be fully at leasure to engage myself,
at the same^ time, in any kind of polemical^war-
fare which may lead to the mutual improve-
ment of our minds.*

The tim^ I was here before being sick, was
not entirely lost. I prepared for the American
^arterly Review^ an article on Florida, but the
constant misfortune which has followed me
since several years did not leave me in this my
first literary experiment in English. It was
highly approved and spoken of by the Editor
of the Review, who wanted only to make a few
alterations in the style, which I, of course, read-
ily granted. For that purpose he gave ii to some
underscribe, who, as little provided of common-
sense and feeling of propriety as of knowledge
of the matter, d^d take the unwarrantable lib-
erty not only toSdd a review of the two works
of Bertram, which I purposedly had discarded,
but went further, and withotit making any alter-
ation in my style in those parts wljich he con-
served, chakg(;d compleately sence and meaning
of others, so as to make-me say exactly the con-
trary of what 1 conscientiously think. As the

ipo JOURNAL [Acb 23

article now stands, it is evident to any other
mind but of the able revisor that it pulls in
diferent directions and wants unity of objects.
You will easyly see that the sentence which ter-
minates the article on the Indians, is not from
my hand, and is jaring with all the rest of the
article. Where I had provided a regular por-
tico for the entrance of the edifice, he has added
a superstructure of historical scraps and stupid
reflections which spoils the whole. If you hear
anybody cite me as the author of this article,
please to contradict it. I do not know I ever
felt so mad about anything before.

I have been in Philadelphia to hear Mr. Fur-
nace preach and heard him with great pleasure.
Your church is increasing very rapidly in Geo.
— why should it not extend to Tallahassee, and
you come there to substitute, reason, learning
and morality, to nonsense, ignorance, fanati-
cism ; even those who do not tiiink as you do,
would be glad of it for decency’s sake, then we
are far from that age of reason, where truth
alone, resplendant, unbleamished, unmixed with
errors, will be the proper food for man. I thank
you very much for th'' interest ypu rake in my
welfare, and I assure you that feeling is perfectly
reciprocal. We have met by chance, but I hope

1827] MISS EMERSON’S LETTER 191

that the friendship you have inspired me, and
you tell me I can claim from you, will be not the
least lasting for it. Mrs. Murat appreciates your
kind remembrances and has not forgottea to
threaten me with your name whenever a harsh
expression finds its way up my thrbat.

YouV friend and Servant,

Achille Murat.

(From « XVIII,” 2 d)

FROM MISS EMERSON TO MRS. RIPLEY*

Yes, from my epicurean leisure, if it so please
you, I scarcely peep out, but let the mutation
go on which is one day to be lost in the fine
elements. “Struggle for existence” — what a

1 Mr. Emerson's good uncle. Rev. Samuel Ripicy, had
married Miss Sarah Aldcn Bradford of Duxbury, a descend-
ant of Governor Bradford of the Old Colony and of John
Aldcn. She was a won?an of great beauty of character and
person, combining ^ ^arkablc intellectual and domestic gifts,
an accomplished scholar and the strength of her husband's
school for boys at Waltham. With open mind, she eagerly
read the new works on science \nd philosophy, whether in
French, German or English. These naturally shook her faith
in the dogmas of the day and she frankly tolcf the change in
her views in' her*Icttcrs to her valued friend. Miss Emerson.
These, of course, drew out sharp criticism. She showed this
letter to Mr. Emerson and allowed him to copy the passage*

192 JOURNAL [Ace *3

phrase for one like you about the bubble life !
How much better the ease of, Mr. Horse and
M rs. Cow and Miss Sparrow. — And these might
fill, the earth with much more comfort to them-
selv«s if Mr. Man and Woman were not in
company — »and would prove to other specta-
tors that there was a designing and good Crea-
tor, — one surely as good as the Deity of old
and late skeptics, who refer not only all the
powers of our mind, but God also, to the fort;ui-
tous concourse of atoms ; that such a being must
necessarily have resulted from these, operating
from eternity. Well, such a being (which leaves
us, it is said, all as before for natural and re-
vealed religion) is better than none. Were athe-
ism the order of the universe, would it be bet-
ter to>take part in active life? Would not death
be indeed terrible then ? To have loved and
been loved would indeed be death to die ! How
much better to be a quiet dreamier ; to lose by
little the breath; to contract the sails of life ; to
despise honour and patriotism and friendship, —
for indeed they w'oulB be but phantoms to em-
bitter the grave. But then, where could be this
thing — this wondrovs substance v.hich loves
and hates and prophesies and reasons a priori^
or was able to? But I know this is begging the

1827] MISS EMERSON’S LETTER 193^

question, and I had lain all to sleep, and it
seemed so natural for my neighbours ; but with-
out any logic in me up started such a mind as
S. A. R. and overset the theory. Anything, the
whole of Calvinism, is nothing so absurd a^that
her spirit, Her anything that acts, should slum-
ber, and by the work of ages again chance in
the form of a lily or a lobster.

“Can’t befieve.” Commit a crime — form
an intrigue, such as Queens and great outlaws
do; blot the fair fabric of your fame, quench the
torch which has been light for others, and you
will have faith enough. Conscience will do an
office which reason seems slow in doing. Early
education would then react like a penal angel.
And is it thus? is human nature in its best estate
so ungracious a thing that fear will influence
where love is useless? Oh no, the budding of the
trees, the gentle breezes will dispel the demon.
Alas ! their buds wuher and the morning soon
clouds. But manSias an invincible appetite for
sorrow and apprehension of some kind which
increases with his yeaVs, and it is only the old
book which can quiet and sublime tlj^em.

Well, yoyftlll^say, What 9 canting old maid this
has become. 5 ^he has forgotten how many bright
thoughts I gave her callous brain on the subject

194 JOURNAL [Age 23

of faith. Oh, these after-births — the bible-be-
liever don’t like them, don’t respect them, since
the glory of Socrates and such like have given
plape to a higher Prophet Your would-be faith
is stumbled at a gibbet. A gibbet. He [i. e., the
criminal] never had any education. Has gone
where He who hung on a - cross will procure
means to instruct him. Besides what ’sf his crime ?
Some sudden theft or rash murder — naught of
ambition which don’t wash out; look not at hijn,
but at some long-faced hypocrite, some cruel
slave-holder, some lying office-seeker, or some
carnivorous man that feeds on human character
and grows fat on the entrails of human defects.

How little can we recapitulate without vomit-
ing at mortal condition, and resigning that the
knot should be cut, if it cannot be untied by the
revelation. Adieu. You speak of those who
dream about future influence and knowledge. It
is natural that the active should :#they can hardly
imagine an existence where the^ are not efficient,
and why should not this part of the constitution
go forward? The Mystics, I believe, think a
higher order of virtue attainable, and I admire
the Mystics without knowing thenu .

MIND

195

1827]

(From Cabot’s R)

Charleston, S. C., April 17, 1827.

Let the glory of the world go where it will,
the mind has its own glory. What it doth, en-
dures. No man can serve many masters. And
often the choice is not given you between great-
ness in the' vorld and greatness of soul, which you
will choose, but both advantages are not com-
patible. The night is fine ; the stars shed down
their severe influences upon me, and I feel ajoy
in my solitude that the merriment of vulgar so-
ciety can never communicate. There is a plea-
sure in the thought that the particular tone of
my mind at this moment may be new in the
universe ; that the emotions of this hour may be
peculiar and unexampled in the whole eternity
of moral being. I lead a new life. I occupy new
ground in the world of spirits, untenanted be-
fore. I commence a career of thought and action
which is expandirJg before me into a distant and
dazzling infinity. Strange thoughts start up like
angels in my way and Reckon me onward. I doubt
not I tread on the highway that lejds to the
Divinity. 4vd why shall J not be content with
these thoughts and this being w'hich give a ma-
jesty to my nature, and forego the ambition to

196 JOURNAL [Ace 23

shine in the frivolous assemblies of men, where
the genuine objects of my a^J^bition are not
revered or known ? Yet my friend is at home in
both these jarring empires, and whilst he taxes
my powers in his philosophic speculations, can
excel the coxcombs, and that, con amore^ in the
fluency of nonsense. Nevertheless I cannot but
remember that God is in the heavens, God is
here, and the eve of mv friend is dull and blind
and cannot perceive Him. But what matter if
this Being be acknowledged or denied, if the faith
cannot impose any more effective restraint on
vice and passion, than morals unsupported by
this foundation ?

CHARLESTON

In Charleston, I like well the decoration of
the churches with monuments. It no doubt has
a powerful tendency to attach.

The negroes in Charleston have a new theory
of the seasons, viz., that the ^umber of people
from the North bring the cold with them.

t

When thy soul

Is filled ”nth a just image, fear not thou
Lest halting rhymes c' unharmoniou^* /ersc
Cripple the fair conception. Leave the heart
Alone to find its language. In all tongues

LISTENING

197

1827]

^ It hath a sovereign instinct that doth teach
An eloquence which rules can never give.
In the high Kour when Destiny ordains
That thou bear testimony to its dooms^
That hour a guiding spirit shall impart
The fervid utterance art could never find.

A poet i^cpi^esented as listening in pious silence,
‘‘To hear the mighty stream of tendency.*' There
is ‘much wisdom, — let me say there is much
duty in his employment.*

(From Cabot’s R and U)

Charleston, S. C., 1827.

He must have

Droll fancies sometimes cross his quiet thoughts,
Who in mv vagrant verse shall look to had*

A holiday from study or from toil,

And consolation to his mortal care.

Such idler will nod be a man of name,

1 Compare in /v\f, Woovl Notes 11 —

Hr^ikcn’ Hc,irkrn’

U’ thou wcnjliijit kntrr the m)'snc tong,

Chanted when the iphcrc wja young.

.....

^ To the open car it singt
Street thf* grnmU of things
Of tendrm y thnnigh endlm
Of iUr-duHt and star-pilgrimigcs, etc.

198 JOURNAL [Ace 23

But must be, and therein resembles me,

A little liable to ridicule,

* •

Because he cares a particle too much

For the opinion of the fickle world ;

And /lotes how Merit does not swim to place

In th’ tides 0/ this world, — and feels the scandal
oft

Of low salute to men of meaner mould:

p ^

And yet has felt, albeit with scorn the while,

A kind of justice in the Seneschal,

The uncivil fate, that made his fortunes vile.

I am frank, my friend, your eye has found

A gypsy muse that reads your lineaments

To tell the faithful fortunes of your life. ,

Go to, I Ml feed my humour to the full,

e^nand the pleasant commentary.

Who loves my verse is one whose rovnig
Detects more beauty than his tongue will own
In art and nature. Nay his traitor tongue,

Sometimes consenting to the coxcomb’s Jest,

Derides the beauty, which delight^, his soul.

He is a man, who, though he told it not,

Mourned in the hour of^manhpod, while he saw

The rich imagination that had tinged

Each earthly, thing with hues from paradise.

Forsake forever his instructed eye; ^ y ^

Bewailed its loss, and felt how dearly bought
Was wisdom, at the price of happiness.

199 .

, 827 ] FOREST SOLITUDE

AJi me! Sometimes in [heady wantonness*]
And sometimes v^jhen the dainty south-wind blew
Its soft luxurious airs, and called the clouds.
Mustering their hosts from all the sunny bays, —
Then, when the piping wind and sounding sea
And tossing boughs combined their cad^ces,

The sweet and solemn melody they made
Enticed him oft in heady wantonness
'Fo scofF at \ciK^wledge, mock the forms of life.
Cast off his years, and be a boy again.

Then has he left his books, and vulgar cares,

And sallied forth across the freshened fields,

With all the heart of high-born cavalier
In quest of^ forest glades hid from the sun,

And dim enchantments that therein abide.

I had rather follow him than talk to him ^
f'ast, fast he leaves the villages behind,

As one who loathed them, yet he loathes them not,
And snuffs the scents which on the dallying gale
The .woods send out ^s gentle harbingers
Bro’t from their inmost glens to lure the step
Of the pleased pilgnm to their alleys green.

I know the pleasures of this humour well,

And, please ynu, reader, I Ml remember them:

First, the glad sense of solitude, the sure^

I These vvo/dft*wcrc struck oflt in the manuscript, because
he preferred to use them in the eighth line below, but neglected
to fill their places.

aoo JOURNAL [Age 23

The absolute deliverance from the yoke
Of social forms, that are as tedipus
Oft to a fretful and romantic man
As a mosquito’s song at summer eve.

In the wood he is alone, and for the hollow chat
Of men that do not love, and will not think.

He has the unpretending company

Of birds and squirrels and the fine race of flowers.

[These verses were carried on at home in U,
and dated August 16.]

He forms his friendships with the flowers
Whose habits or whose hue may please h*m best;
Goes by the red and yellow populace
That with their vulgar beauty spot the plain,

To find the honoured orchis, seldom seen,

The low pyrola with a lilac’s smell,

Or the small cinque-foil, the wild strawberry’s friend
He speculates with love on nature’s forms.

Admires a calyx much as Winkclm^nn
7'he architecture of a Doric pilc;i
Not more he doted on the line
Of frieze or triglyph or, on architrave.

Than doth this dreamer on the slender shaft.

With arms and stipules graced, that lifts in air
The lily or the loose-strwe, tapestried j^feh leaves ;
And close below,

The faithful capsule to transmit its race,

1827] COMPENSATION loi.

Like from its like, to another year of flowers,

Once more to the food of tuneful bird
Low stooping on swift wing, or busy bee,

Or the small nameless eaters that can find
A country in a leaf.

(From Cabot’s R)

«

Alexandria, May 5, 1827.
My days nan onward like the weaver’s beam.
I'hey have no honour among men, they have
no* grandeur in the view of the invisible world.
It is as if a net of meanness were drawn around
aspiring men, through which their eyes are kept
on mighty objects, but the subtile fence is for-
ever interposed.

“ They also serve who only stand and wait.”

Aye, but they must wait in a certain temper and
in a certain equipment. I'hey must wait, as the
knight on the van of the embattled line, stand-
ing in the stirn^s, his spear in rest, his steed
foaming, ready for the career with the speed of
a whirlwind. Am I, the accomplished cavalier?

COMI’KNSATIONS .

In the vle^vof Compensations nothingisgiven.
There is'always a price, f^urity is the price at
which impurity may be sold. If I sell my cruelty

'202 JOURNAL [Age 23

I shall become merciful of necessity. No man
ever had pride but he suffered frcnm it ; or parted
with it for meekness, without feeling the advan-
tage of the blessed change.

The angels — see Psalm 91. — The virtues are
tfie angels.

TO HIS BROTHER EDWARD

/

May 8.

Glad of Dr. Channing, as some amends for
the dullness, I fear I can’t say degeneracy, of the
pulpit in the whole country. If men abhorred
nonsense as much as injury, a new race of Icon-
oclasts would outrun the fury of the Knoxes in
demolishing our pews and spires. I suppose
whenever the average intellect of the clergy de-
clinesiin the balance with the average intellect
of the people, it must happen that the churches
will be shut up and a new order of things begin.
The hazard of such a revolution who can tell
And yet I have hardly been tr. church this win-
ter without feeling that the beam of the balance
trembled already. I im consoled by the reflec-
tion that there is much in man that operates to
postpone the convulsion, or to guj[j|e the ship
in the event of a storm.

18 * 7 ]

IMAGININGS

203

TO MISS EMERSON

*

Alexandria, D. C., May 15.

I am writing here in pleasant durance till, the
sun will let me go home. ... I am not lAire I
am a jot better or worse than when I left hoine
. . . only in this, that I preached Sunday morn-
ing in Washington without any pain or incon-
venience. ... I have not lost my courage or
the possession of my thoughts. ... It seems
to me lately that we have many capacities which
we lack time and occasion to improve. If I read
the Bridi of Lammermoory a thousand imper-
fect suggestions arise in my mind, to which could
I give heed, I should be a novelist. ' When I chance
to light on a verse of genuine poetry, it may be
in a corner of a newspaper, a forcible sympathy
awakens a legion of little goblins in the recesses of
the soul, and if I had leisure to attend to the fine
tiny rabble, I should straightway become a poet.

't

1 Mr, Emerson's strange fondness, retained from the time
of first reading this novel, •appeaued at the Scott Centennial oc-
casion in 1871. He said, ** The Bride of Lammermoor ^ which
almost goes back to ^l^schylus for a counterpart as a painting
of Fate, leaiifig^on every reader the impression of the high-
est and purest tragedy." Sec Miscellanies^ Centenary Ed.,
p. 465 ; also Essays^ First Scries, p. 35.

204 JOURNAL [Age *3

In my day dreams, I so often hunger and thirst
to be a painter, beside all the spasmodic attach-
ments I indulge to each of the sciences and each
province of letters.' They all in turn play the
coquette with my imagination, and it may be I
shall die at the last a forlorn bachelor jilted of
them all.

But all which makes these reveries{noticeable
is the indirect testimony they seem to bear to
the most desirable attributes of human nature.
If it have so many conatus^ they are not in vain,
but point to a duration ample enough for the en-
tire satisfaction of them all. They suggest a just
idea of the world to come, which has always been
made repulsive to men’s eyes from the inade-
quate representations of systems of religion
which ‘looked at it only in one aspect, and that
(I am forced to use a word in a limited sense it
ought not to bear) a religious one. But I am sat-
isfied the future world ought nofso much to be
regarded as the place of final rrforal reward, but

as the after state of man, since it is probable that

• *

I The heads drawn in pen and ink on the margins and
blank spaces of^he earlier journals show much njitive skill and
observation of feature and cxfJreSvsion. He had fib instruction*
except the example of bis friend and schoolmate, William H*
Furness.

1827] JOHN QUINCY ADAMS 205

a mgment of that infinity holds no more relation
of reward to the^past than doth a moment of the
present life, for every moment of this life in-
volves a relation of reward. And in this regard
it is assuredly more consistent with our most ele-
vated and therefore truest notions of God, that
the education of man should there be carried on
by furnishing space and excitement to the de-
velopment of*every faculty that can add accom-
plishment to the noble being. And though our
poor tools of art, the colours, the pallet, the
chisel, rhyme, and the pipes and strings of sound,
must yield to finer and more efficient means, yet
it would be to neglect those tokens of intended
intellectual progress disclosed ’in our nature, to
doubt that scope would be afforded to the com-
passing of the great ideal results of which*these
tools are now the poor, inadequate instruments.

THB PRESIDENT

Ad.EXANDRiA, May 19, 1827.

Mr. Adams went out a swimming the other
day into the Potomac, an 3 went near to a boat
which was coming down the river. Some rude
blackguard^ were in it, ^ho, not knowing the
character of the swimmer, amused themselves
with laughing at his bald head as it poppled up

2o6 journal [Age 24

and down in the water, and, as they drew nearer,
threatened to crack open his rpund pate if he
came nigh them. The President of the United
States was, I believe, compelled to waive the
poin,t of honour and seek a more retired bathing-
place.

New York, June 1.

I am sometimes fond, when I am ^^ncomfort-
able, because to retreat on our own affections is
the best way to put a rampart between us and
fortune.

(From Pocket Note-book)

Lions seen in Philadelphia

I. Deaf and Dumb Asylum.

а. Academy of Arts.

3. Philosophical Society.

4. Sully’s painting rooms.

5. West’s Picture.

б. Waterworks of Schuylkill.

7. Mrs. Royall.

8. Hall of the Declaration 6f Independence.

9. Market.

4 ♦

Lions of New York

I. Broatfway and Battery.

a. City Hall.

Van Buren and Emmett.

i8i7j JOURNEY NORTHWARD 207

[Mr. Emerson worked his way slowly home-
ward, cautiously theeding any remonstrances from
his chest at too rapid changing of latitude. He
had opportunities to preach, and did so, in.St.
Augustine, Charleston, Washington, Phikdel-
phia, and New York. He reached the ancestral
home in the third week in June, and joined his
mother at fhe Manse, his grandfather’s house,
where they were for the time the guests of Dr.
Ripley. Invitations to supply the pulpit of his
father’s church in Boston came to him. The im-
provement due to the Southern journey shows
in the retprn of courage and energy which ap-
pears in hj^ writings.

Yet he still had uncomfortable warnings that
he was, as he said, “all clay, no iron.” In a let-
ter written to his brother William in the end of
June, he wonders whether, after all, he must give
up the Ministry, for, he said, “my lungs in their
spiteful lobes sing sexton and sorrow when-
ever I only ask 'them to shout a sermon for
me.” He took a better room in Divinity Hall
for the rest of the year. H*e was asked to preach
in Northampton for several weeks in the early
Autumn.] ’

2o8 journal [Age 24

[From Cabot^s U]

, ♦*

AT THE OLD MANSE

Concord, June^ 1827 .
Awed I behold once more
My old familiar haunts; here the blue river,

The same blue wonder that my infant eye
Admired, sage doubting whence the traveHer came,—
Whence brought his sunny bubbles dre he washed
The fragrant flag-roots in my fathcr^s fields,

And where thereafter in the world he went.

Look, here he is unaltered, save that now
He hath broke his banks and flooded all the vales
With his redundant waves. »

Here is the rock, where yet, a simple chUd,

I caught with bended pin my earliest fish,

Much triumphing, — and those the fields
Overevhose flowers I chased the butterfly,

A blooming hunter of a fairy fine.

And hark ! where overhead the ancient crows
Hold their sour conversation irf the sky.

f

T^hese are the same, but I am not the same,

But wiser than 1 was, and wise enough
Not to regret the changes, though they cost
Me many aisigh. Oh, call not nature dumb;

These trees and stones a^e audible to^qfe,

These idle flowers, that tremble in the wind,

I understand their faery syllables.

THE STORM

209

1827]

Anil all their sad significance. This wind,

That rustles dou^n the well-known forest road, —
It hath a sound more eloquent than speech.

The stream, the trees, the grass, the sighing winj^.
All of them utter sounds of (ad)monishment
And grave parental love.

They are not of our. race, they seem to say.

And yet have knowledge of our moral race,

And somewha? of majestic sympathy.

Something of pity for the puny clay,

Tliat holds and boasts the immeasurable mind.

I feel as I were welcome to these trees
After long months of weary wandering,
Acknowleciged by their hospitable boughs.

I'hey know me as their son, for side by side,
They were coeval with my ancestors,

Adorned with them my country's primitive times,
And soon may give my dust their funeral shade.

(Fiom Cabot's R)

* THE STORM

Fast, fast across»thc savage sea
My little bark is blown ;

Down in the ocean mournfuHy
'The stars sank •one by one.
jesu Maria ! pray for me,

My hope is well nigh gone.

aio JOURNAL [Agb 2+

And now the heavens, which gleamed before.
Were sealed with windy cloudy,

And I beheld the stars no more,

No more in shining crowds,

^ut loud above, the tempest tore
The canvas and the shrouds.

[The following lines, written at this time,
were appended as a last verse to the little poem
“ Fame,” written in 1824, given earlier in these
extracts, and printed in the Poems (CentenaVy
Ed., Appendix, p. 384).]

Go then, sad youth ! and shine;.

Go sacrifice to Fame.

Put Love, Joy^ Health upon the shrme^

And Life to fan the flame.

Thyself, poor dupe ! for praises barter
And die to Fame an honoured martyr.*

(From“XVIII,’: zd)

TO MISS EMERSQN

^u»e, 1827.

Although I strive to kee*p my soul in a polite
equilibriuni, etc., I belong to the good sect of

' In copying them later stilf, he changed tKe last two lines to

“ B«ing for Kcming bravdy bartrr,
And die to Fame a happy martyr.’*

1827 ] LETTER TO HIS AUNT an

the Seekers, and conceive that the dissolution
of the body will’ have a wonderful effect on the
opinion of all creed-mongers. How the flimsy
sophistries that have covered nations, uncl^n
cobwebs that have reached their long dangling
threads over whole ages, issuing from the dark
bowels of Athanasius and Calvin, will shrink
to nothing^at that sunburst of truth; and no-
body will be more glad than Athanasius and
Cal,vin. A glorious moment ; and yet a young
man does not wish it arrived. I do not think
it will be dreadful to me, and yet wish to inter-
pose thirty, or forty years of strong life between
me and it.^ In my frigidest moments, when I
put behind me the subtler evidences, and set
Christianity in the light of a piece of human
history, much as Confucius or Solomon might
regard it, I believe myself immortal. The beam
of the balance trembles, to be sure, but settles
always on the right side. For otherwise all
things look so silly. The sun is silly, and the
connexion of beings and worlds such mad non-
sense. I say this, I say that in pure reason I
believe my immortality, because I jiave read
and heard ditq^ that the doctrine hangs wholly
on Christianity. This, to be sure, brings safety,
but I think that I get bare life without. I have

.212 JOURNAL [Ace 24

no pleasure in the curiosity that hence anses
to be falsified at that undeceiving hour. I covet
no surprises then. I am content, if I can, to
know what shall befall me. There 's one con-
sideration, however, one check without which I
am persuaded the soul would leap in its dark
womb, the body, at the approach of the future.
I mean the fear of death itself, the instinctive
melancholy which long trained pfiilosophy does
not strip off. If it be really true,and we plodders
are to be so grand and infinite — mere beams
of glory — spirits, — one would think the soul
would be so enamoured of the strong suggestion
that it would run before to meet its fate. But it
is sedate instead, or, as you would say, wallows
in the mire of life. I hope you won’t scold a
letter which adds nothing, even by guess, to the
mass of truth, but to me ’t is pleasant in idle-
ness to hover on the verge of worlds we cannot
enter, and explore the bearings of the piled
mists I cannot penetrate. R. W. E.

(FroM Cabot’s R)

, Concord, June 29, 1 827.

The man who bat^s no jot of courage when
oppressed by fate, who, missing of his design,
lays hold with ready hand on the unexpected

i8*7] MAGNET-HOPE 213

event, and turns it to his own account, and in
the crudest suffering has that generosity of per-
ception that he is sensible of a secret joy in the
addition this event makes to his knowledge^ —
that man is truly independent, — “ he tak^ his
revenge on fortune ” — is independent of time
and chance; fortune may rule his circumstances,
but he overrules fortune. The stars cannot
thwart with evil influences the progress of such
a spul to grandeur. — See Taylor’s Holy Livings
p. 128, Philadelphia Edition.

I have seen a skilful experimenter lay a mag-
net among.fi lings of steel, and the force of that
subtle fluid, entering into each fragment, ar-
ranged them all in mathematical lines, and each
metallic atom became in its turn a magnet^om-
municating all the force it received of the load-
stone.

[a coop hope]

August 16.

There is a pleasure that lias no alloy, in a hope
so confident and steadfast, that it pushes for-
ward, through good report and evil, to the
accomplishment of its end, that it acts as what
is spiritual should act, with a scorn of material

214 JOURNAL [Ace 24

obstacles, with a divine contempt for all that;men
think will hinder and bring it tto nought ; and
lo ! instead [of J a heavy defeat, it springs elastic,
an^, as ’t were, refreshed from apparent discom-
fituie, neither contracting its sail nor bating one
tittle of its joyful pride. When bystanders say,
Look, there is a lion in the way, it answers.
But I am a man and mightier than lipns. When
they say, Men counterwork, it replies. Aye,
but I go in the strength of God.

It is what is unseen in all actions that gives
them their character. It is what is unseen that
gives splendour in the view of wise men.

• ••••••«

TO MISS EMERSON

August 24, 1827.

When I attended church, and the man in the
pulpit was all clay and not of tuneable metal, 1
thought that if men would avoid that general
language and general manner in which they strive
to hide all that is peculiar, and would say only
what was uppermost in their own minds, after
their own individual manner, every man would
be interesting. Everyman is a newffreation: can
do something best, has some intellectual modes
or forms, or a character the general result of all

1827] EVIDENCES — SOLITUDE 215

such, as no other agent in the universe has ; if
he would exhibit* that., it must needs be engaging,
a curious study to every inquisitive mind. But
whatever properties a man of limited intellect
feels to be peculiar he studiously hides; he is
ashamed or afraid of himself, and all his commu-
nications to men are unskilful plagiarisms from
the commqn stock of thought and knowledge,
and he is of course flat and tiresome.

«

’Tis an old and vulgar maxim, Take care of
the minutes, and the hours will take care of
themselves; but like many old and vulgar things
'tis better jhan gold of Ophir, wisely used.

The Emperor Napoleon is as much a proof
of heaven and eternity as the life of St. Pauk He
proves how impossible it is to satisfy the human
soul. But he neglected, and the world neglects,
to draw the right inference from their failures.

FOR A SERMON ON SOLITUDE

There is a story oY a m*an who on his death-
bed called to him his profligate son and left him
large posse^ipns, only exacting of him the pro-
mise to spend an hour every day alone. The son
kept his word and became a wise and good man.

2i6 journal [Age 24.

Of Mr. Adams it was memorably said by
President Kirkland, “ For. fifty years he rose
before the sun.”

*

" Whenever Agesilaus made an excursion, he
-lodged in the temples most renowned for sanc-
tity; and whereas upon mafiy occasions we do
not choose that men should see what we are
about, he was desirous to have the gods them-
selves inspectors and witnesses of his conduct.”

l^LUTARCH.

GENIUS AND DOMESTICITY

Aunt Mary used her thimble twice as a seal
to once for her needle, and I have heard my
mother remark that her own was too much worn
ever to make the indented impression on wax
that Aunt Mary’s did.

The Alpine flower that grew in fearless beauty
amid storm and cold under the awful shadow of
the avalanche will wither and die in the sunny
gardens of the plains^

1827] THE UNIVERSAL MIND aiy

THU UNIVERSAL MIND
«

Northampton, October^ 1827.

. . . There prevailed anciently the opinion
that the human mind was a portion of the* Di-
vinity, separated for a time from the infinite
mind, and when lifd was closed, reabsorbed into
the Soul of th^ world ; or, as it was represented
by a lively image, Death was but the breaking
of a vial of water in the ocean. But this portion
of the Divine mind in childhood and youth they
thought was yet pure as it came from God and
yet untairrfed by the impurities of this world.
There was rjjuch of truth in the^beautiful theory.

SONNET

JVrltten in Sickness

I bear in youth the sad infirmities
That’usc to undo the limb and eve of age.

It has pleased Heaven to break the dream of bliss
That lit my onward path with bright presage^

And my unserviceable limbs forego

The sweet delights I found in fields and farms,

On windy hills, whose tops with morning^glow,

And lakes, lojic^mirrors of /Virora’s charms.

Yet I think on them in the sleepless night —

Still breaks that morn, though dim, in Memory's eye.

21 8 JOURNAL. [Agb 24

And the clear soul doth the foul train defy
Of pale Disease that would her petce affright.

Please God, I ’ll wrap me in my innocence
And bid each awful muse drive the damned harpies
^ hence.

Cambridge, No. 14 Divinity Hall,

December 7, 1827.'

[In December he went on a isii (probably
an invitation to preach) to Concord, New Hamp-
shire ; hence the notification, in the following
entry, to the possible future reader of his jour-
nal, for there he met Ellen Louisa Tucker, and
fell in love. She was the daughter of Mr. Beza
Tucker, a Boston merchant who had lately died,
and her mother had married Mr. W. A. Kent
of Concord, N. H.]

(I ought to apprize the reader that I am a
bachelor and to the best of my belief have never
been in love.)

I In this journal, the eighth line was written, —

And lakes that mirTored all Aurora*! charms j
for which it seemed better to substitute the form given by Mr,
Emerson in a later copy ( in Cabot’s U ). In the last line of that
copy, however, he substituted ‘‘dark” for “ damned,” prob-
ably because he deemed the latter unbecoming in one of his
profession, yet, as stronger, it is here retained.

18*7} PLACES AND DAYS 219

Robinson Crusoe when he was in any perplex-
ity was wont to ^etir? to a part of his cave which
he called his thinking corner. Devout men have
found a stated spot so favourable to a habit pf
religious feeling that they have worn the yolid
rock of the oratory with their knees. I have found
my ideas very refractory to the usual bye-laws
of Association. In the graveyard my muscles were
twitched by some ludicrous recollections, and I
am,apt to be solemn at a ball. But, whilst places
are alike to me, I make great distinction between
states of mind. My days are made up of the
irregular syccession of a very few different tones
of feeling. These are my feasts and fasts. Each
has his harbinger, some subtle sign by which I
know when to prepare for its coming. Among
these some are favourites, and some are to me as
the Eumenides. But one of them is the sweet
asylum where my greatest happiness is laid in,
which I keep in sight whenever disasters befal
me, and in which it is like the life of angels to
live.

SONG

The cup of life is not so shallow ,

That, we have drained the best,

That all the wine at once we swallow,

And lees make all the rest.

220 JOURNAL [Ace 24

Maids of as soft a bloom shall marry
As Hymen yet hath blessed.

And fairer forms are in the quarry
Than Phidias released.*

TO MISS EMERSON

November 20, 1827.

It is difficult to speak with confidence of re-
ligious feeling. The mind recurs at once to his-
tory for authority. It finds the great multitude
of the best men who have lived and left a name
to be what the enthusiast calls “ Cold and pru-
dent Christians” — Bacons, Lockes, Butlers,
Johnsons, Buckminsters. But the enthusiast ad-
mits or insists on the fact that the world is against
him, and appeals confidently to the received lan-
guage of religion in every age, which has always
expected the suffrage only of a minority. At the
same time he proudly cites a concurrent line of
elect souls, coming down from the beginning,
who saw the light that was not vouchsafed to the
world, and were not disobedient to the heavenly
vision. The apostles, the early martyrs, the
Ebionites, the tenants of 7 'hebais, the Bene-

I These verses appear t? have been wnf.cn earlier in the
year, — it is impossible to tell just svhen, — but this seems an
appropriate place for their intnxiuction.

221

i8z7l RELIGIOUS FEELING

dictines, the Waldenses, the Puritans, the Mo-
ravians, down td Pascal, Wesley, and Cowper,
beside what has been done and suffered from
kindred motives by unnumbered devotees, in
“ the mysterious blast,” out of the pale of
Christianity, and many indications of the same
spirit before its advent, as the Gymnosophists
of India, and Essencs of the Jews: all these bear
witness to a principle in human nature inerad-
icaj)le in the shifting influences and forms of so-
ciety, firm in the flux of ages, that suggests and
sanctions the crucifixion of the flesh before the
mighty iqiage of God within the soul. More-
over, in our wariest, most philosophic hours
the heart compels us to respect even what we
deem the extravagant issues of devotion. The
proper emotion is wonder: the proper duty* per-
haps a diligent study of the phenomenon and of
ourselves ; but I think no good man will laugh
at Wesley, and no wise man be secure of his
own superiority. ’Pis always grateful to find men,
the solidity of whose understanding is beyond
dispute, giving them*selve*s heartily to devotion.
The piety of Newton is inestimable; and there
is something|iwful in tluj gravity and apprehen-
sive contrition of Johnson’s closet. It gives a
start to the secure spirit, like his who

222 JOURNAL [Ace *4

“ . . . heard the bell of the convent toll

For a departing sinner’s sorl.”

•

Nevertheless we are not to be bound by sug-
gestions of sentiment, which our reason not only
does not sanction, but also condemns. ’T were
to throw our pilot into the sea in compliment to
the winds. And when the mystics tell me, as
the mystics will not hesitate to do, that there is
sin in every good work until I have the assurance
clear as the sun in heaven of a new connexion of
God with my soul, of a new birth, or what not,
I shall give them no regard ; I shall be content,
while the laws of my nature remain the same,
with “ the beggarly elements of justice and char-
ity” — self-condemned, 1 own, at the lax discharge
of my known duties, but not curious to add to
my genuine grief horrors for imaginary and
remediless delinquencies. Does this reasoning
seem to you unsafe? Is it not to be applied to
ail that we judge false doctrine, coming under
whatever authority of names and age? Were it
not a crime of which accounf would be demanded,
and involving possibly hereafter many more than
myself, if I should surrender to the casual and
morbid exercise of the sentiment of a midnight
hour the steady light of all my days, my most

i8z7l THOUGHT IN RELIGION 223

vigorous and approved thoughts, barter the sun
for the waning moon? ’Tis all idle talking. In
the extreme it is plain enough. But the diffi-
culty I contemplated consists in finding tjie
proper mean; in discerning how much (for cer-
tainly something) is laudable, and how much
extravagant in their -theory of duty; in learning
how much we lack of the love of God, and in
adjusting life betwixt reason and feeling ; e. g., it
may be plausibly denied that ’t is worth while to
get rich, or to make acquisitions in science. But
shall a wise man refrain?

December 17, 1827.

. . . But now and then the lawless imagina-
tion flies out and asserts her habit. I revisit the
verge of my intellectual domain. How the rest-
less soul runs round the outmost orbit and builds
her bold conclusion as a tower of observation
from whence her eyes wander incessantly in the
unfathomable abyss. I dimly scrutinize the vast
constitution of being into which this present shall
be absorbed, in which* we ^hall look back, per-
adventure, to Christianity as to a rosary on which,
in the morn 0/ existence, we learned to count our
prayers, and think it idle to pause in the train
of mighty meditation, to remember in our an-

224 JOURNAL [Ace 24

dent pupilage the rudiments of those stupendous
moral energies we shall wield at that hour. But
no ; no thought, no perception of truth, how
liijiited soever, can become insignificant. God
conTmunicates with the thoughts of men ; and to
whatever magnificence of nature and acquisition
we may attain, the whole past will always be the
instrument of future works.

. . . Connexion between God and the Soul, —
What is religion but this connexion? Is not this
the thought that always invests human nature,
though in rags and filth, with sublimity, — that
wheresoever a man goeth, there goes an animal
containing in his soul an image of the Being by
whom the Universe subsists? The Mind is his
image and mirror. Is it not that, with whatever
depravations blotted and disguised, God makes
the main idea therein to which all others arrange
themselves as threads of steel to a magnet, or as
all the magnets of the world to the polar axis ?
Is not the mind in health just in proportion as
that idea is clear? ff that is obscured, is there
not death in the mind? (I use mind in its largest
sense, for I see that fhe intellect may be vigor-
ous, as in Laplace, and refuse to honor its Maker.)
But I am confounded by the anomaly. These

18*7] GOD WITHIN US 22$

views seem to me to hold. I cannot understand
the feelings of 'the .Atheist. I cannot believe
Atheism and genius to consist. And yet what
motive for the pretence? Doesn’t the heart «ay
Hallelujah ^amid its prayers for Bacon, Newton
and Locke, for Socrates and Cicero? If there
were no lobsidedneSs, no disease in the Soul, the
idea of Deitv would be its exact and constant
measure of its progression. When that was
gre,at, the mind was great. Its own glory would
keep even pace with the glory it gave. Is not
this unutterably beautiful and grand, this life
within life, this literal Emanuel, God within us?
When this .shall have been taught worthily to
men, the wailing spirits of the prophets may bend
from their spheres, for the Principle of Plvil shall
come to his end, and God shall be all in all.*

Authors or Books mentioned or referred
to in Journals of 1827

Bible ;

Pindar: Socrates;

Cicero; Seneca; Epictetus; Plutarch, ;

Athanasius ;

Philippe Comines;#A/t’»itf/m;

Calvin.

Bacon; Shakspeare;

226 JOURNAL [Ac« 24

Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dyings
James Harrington, apud Hume;

Pascal; Locke; Newton; La Bruyere ;
•Cowper; Young; Berkeley; Butler;
Madame de Stael ; Scott, Quentin Durward^
Bride of Lammermoor, Rokeby ;

Buckminster, Ch^Ltinin^’ Sermons ;

Sampson Reed, Growth of the Mind,

JOURNAL XIX

(From “Sermons and Journals,” 1828-29, and Cabot’i
* Q and R)

[Some letters, written by Emerson to his brothers
and aunt .duj'ing the winter and spring of this
year, which are quoted by Mr. Cabot in his
Memoirs, show the good sense with which at
this critical period he yielded to necessity instead
of fighting Fate, like his brother Edward. Thus
the eldett brother saved and the valiant younger
brother lc\st his life. In onp of these letters,
Waldo says : “ I am living cautiously, yea, tread-
ing on eggs, to strengthen my constitution. It is
a long battle this of mine between life and ^eath.
. . . So I never write when I can walk, and espe-
cialjy when I can laugh.” This accounts for the
scanty journal-writing in this year, and he re-
fused many flattering invitations to preach. Thus
his proper health gradually reasserted itself.J

(From Cabot’s R)

'January y 1828.

Montaigne says he is sorry Brutus’s treatise
on Virtue is lost, because he would hear one.

228 JOURNAL [Age 24

«

who so well understood the practice, discuss the
theory of virtue. ’T is weU said. It is always
dangerous when an appeal is made from the ser-
mon to the preacher, when the bold reason of
the hearer quotes his life against his doctrine.

Demades told the Athenians that he had
observed that they never treated of peace except
in black clothes; so, says Plutarch, men never
reduce their diet except amidst cataplasms, clys-
ters and medicines; so also men do not turn for
enjoyment to another world till their hopes in
this have failed them. ,

“ Age gives good advice when it is no longer
able to give a bad example.”

We think ill of a man who has an ill gait, or
a defective utterance, or bad countenance, and
shun his acquaintance, but a man who wastes
his time does not excite aversion.

It has been observed that particular sects have
their own physiognomy. But we keep the same
face and air from year to year ; — it shows that
we have wasted our time.

It is said public opinion will not bear it.
Really ? Public opinion, I am sorry to say, will

I8z8] PUBLIC OPINION 229

*

bear, a great deal of nonsense. There is scarce
any absurdity so* gross, whether in religion, poli-
tics, science, or manners, which it will not bear.
It will bear the amazing conference of New Leba-
non. It will bear Andrew Jackson for President.
It will bear the convicted ignorance of Captain
Symmes. It will bear the obscenities of the Bos-
ton Theatre. Lord Bacon never spoke truer
word than when he said, There ’s more of the
foc^l in the world than the wise.

I have once or twice been apprehensive that
I was reading in vain, that the cultivation of my
mind did not turn to any good account in my
intercourse with men. I am now satisfied of the
contrary. 1 have every inch of my merits.
More is conceded to me than I have a jus'dtitle
to. I am oftener compelled to deplore my ig-
norance than to be pleased with my knowledge.
I have no knowledge that I do not want.

January^ 1828.

In Concord, N. H., I visited the prison and
went into the cells. At this season thgy shut up
the convicts, ip these little granite chambers at
about 4 o’clock p. m. and let them out about
7 o’clock A. M. — 15 dreadful hours.

230 JOURNAL [Aob 24

\

EXTRACTS FROM WORDfWORTH *

(From Cabot’s Q)

“ But in calm peace the appointed Victim slept
A? he had fallen, in magnanimity
Of spirit too capacious to require
That Destiny her course should change/^

Dion.

‘‘ Tens of thousands rent from ofF the tree
Of hopeful life, by Battle’s whirlwind blown ,
Into the deserts of eternity.’’ iii, 218.

‘‘ Not in entire forgetfulness.

And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we coriic
From God who is our home.”

Intimations of Immortality.

. From Cambrian wood and moss
Druids descend, auxiliars of the Cross,

Bards nursed on blue Plinlim'mon’s still abode.”

Ecclesiastical Sonnety X.

There is a radiant but* a short lived flame
That burns for poetry in the dawning east.”

I Because of the confused manner in which the journals were
kept during this unsettled period, it is hard to‘tell whether these
extracts and the Essay on Poetry which follows were written
in 1825 or the end of 1826.

131

1828 ] SELECTIONS

“ Know — that he who feels contempt
For any living thing, hath faculties
Which he hath never used ; that thought with him
Is in its infancy.’*

Lims left upon a Seat in a JTew TTvee.

“ Intent to trace the ideal path of right

More fair than heaven’s broad causeway paved with
stars •

Which Dion learned to measure with delight.”

Dion.

A soul by force of sorrows high
Upliftcd^to the purest sky
Of undisturbed humanity.”

How touching when^ at midnight, sweep
Snow*muffled winds and all is dark.”

m

Sonnet /, On the River Duddon.

From her unworthy^ seat, the cloudy stall
Of Time, breaks forth triumphant Memory.”

‘‘ But Shapes that come not at an earthly call
Will not depart whcA mortal voices bid.”

232 JOURNAL [Age 24

(From Cabot’s Q)

1828?

NOTES ON POETRY.’

A fault that strikes the readers of Mr. Words-
worth is the direct pragmatical analysis of ob-
jects, in their nature poeticy but which all other
poets touch incidentally. He mpuls the moon
and the waters and the bulrushes, as his main
business. Milton and Shakspeare touch them
gently, as illustration or ornament. Beds of
flowers send up a most grateful scent to the pas-
senger who hastens by them, but let 'him pitch
his tent among them and he will find himself
grown insensible to their fragrance. And it
must have occurred frequently to our reader
that 'brilliant moonlight will not bear acquaint-
ance. Nothing is more glorious than the full
moon to those who ride orw,alk under its beams.
But whoso goes out of doors expressly to see
it returns disappointed. Mr. Wordsworth is a
poet with the same ei;ror tjiat wasted the genius

I It may be of interest to compare with these early jucig-
mcnts what Mr. Emerson said of Wordsworth in 1840 and
in 1 843 ; see in Natural Hishry of Intellecti Papers from the
Dialy' ^'Modern Literature/’ and Europe and European
Books” ; also in English Traits^ chapters i and jcvii.

iSzS] POETRY — WORDSWORTH 233

of the alchemists and astrologers of the Middle
Age. These attempted to extort by direct
means the principle of life, the secret substance
of matter from material things; and those to
extract intelligence from remoter nature, instead
of observing that science is ever approximating
to truth by dint oP application to present wants,
and not by Jiiearch after general and recondite
Truth. Mr. Wordsworth is trying to distil the
essence of poetry from poetic things, instead of
being satisfied to adorn common scenes with such
lights from these sources of poetry as nature will
always furnish to her true lovers. We feel the
same sort of regret that is occa3ioned when Aris-
totle forsakes the Laws of the Intellect and the
Principles of Ethics for researches into the
nature of mind.

“ The man who shows his heart
Is hooted for his nudities, and scorned.”

Young.

There’s a great difference between good poetry
and everlasting poetry.

Shakspeare alludes to himself nowhere in his
drama. The sonnets. Homer keeps out of sight
except in two places. A grand trait. It is like*
Providence, f^ide Herder. Mem. Pope’s account

234 JOURNAL [Acs 24

of his own resemblance to Providence in- my
blotting book. — A different age. In antiquity,
nature towered above all man had done : it sunk
the' personal importance of man. The bard
taugnt as the minister preaches, and felt an
impertinence in introducing self. Now man has
grown bigger, a commercial,' political, canalling,
writing animal. Philosophy inverts , itself, and
poetry grows egotistical.

Shakspeare immortalizes his characters. They
live to every age and, as we say of Christianity^
have a prospective adaptation. Ben Jonson’s are
all dead. Read Alchymist and the rest. They
are all in brocade. We feel that they are a past
generation, our great grandfathers and mothers.
And so their motives and manners are in bro-
cade, not vital to us ; as the Euphuism of one.
But universal man appreciates Shakspeare, —
boys, rabble, every man of ^rong sense thqugh
uncultivated as . Exceptions rare. Gib-

bon, — but he had no acumen for poetry; that
ear was deaf ; witness^ his , poetical opinions in
notes. So Dr. Priestley, I guess, had no ear ; he
calls Mrs.Barbauld one of the best poets Eng-
land can boast of (see* his Life^ p^ 69). Milton
docs not get this general suffrage.

I find to-day one of Shakspeare’s quibbles.

1818] POETRY — MONTGOMERY -235

Miranda tells Ferdinand who carries wood to
the pile,

“ When this burns,

'T will weep for having wearied you.”

February y i8a8.

A very unaccountable poem, that Pelican
Island. A ipixfure of greatness with defects that
don’t appear to be slovenliness, like the slovenly
greatness of Dryden, so much as want of deli-
cate poetic perception ; but all along, at inter-
vals, glitter lines that might decorate Paradise
Lost. And there ’s a general grandeur of con-
ception. Buf in the minor poeips he is decidedly
an ordinary genius again. It is the singular merit
of the Pelican Island that ’tis original both in
the design, which perhaps makes all its gfeat-
ness, and in the execution. It is a poem worth
ten Excursions y being generally a complete con-
trast to Wordsworth’s verses. These abounding
in fact, and Wordsworth wanting. These seizing
coarse and tangible features for description or
allusion, and Wordsworth the metaphysical and
evanescent. This teaching body, andW/jrdsworth
soul. This usiag a very large encyclopediacal dic-
tion, and Wordsworth affecting that which may be
proper to the passions in common life. It seems

236 JOURNAL [Age 24

to me that who could write this could write ten
times as well. Milton would write it off in un-
premeditated manuscript and lay it up as a block
to be hewn and carved and polished. But Milton
would as soon have hanged himself as published
it as it stands. Had it been found and printed
by Montgomery’s executors, instead of Mont-
gomery, it would not surprise. The puzzle is
that there ’s quite a large portion of the Poem
is mere extemporaneous blank verse, only fit, for
the fount of a newspaper.

(From Cabot’s R)

Divinity Hall, February 14, 1828.

Burnap was very witty to-night.* He said
theje was one man who had the queerest repu-
tation — Dr. Watts — such a mixture of hea-
thenism and scholastic learning and Calvinism
and love and despair and njully-grubs — Ke was
the funniest old cock in the theological walk ;
that that old Betty should be one of the three
legs that support fhe X^inity, and that the
church should go chanting his hymns for cen-
turies, mistaking the effusions of belly-ache for

1 Rev. George Washington Bumap, at that time a divinity
student. He received the dcgrccsof A. B., 1824; A.M.,1827;
S.T.D., 1849; from Harvard University.

18281 DR. WATTS — DEITY 237

t

the .inspirations of David — was the greatest
phenomenon. Then, that he should write a trea-
tise on Logic, and then one on the Improve-
ment of the Mind ! Then, that his sun should
set clear after being foggy all day ! And* Dr.
Doddridge ! who owed all his fame to his get-
ting up at five o’clock every morning and writing
for two hours^ what everybody knew and said
before.

•

Religion aims to make a man at peace with
himself. A man who is angry is not at peace
with himself, or who is proud, or who steals.
And, as we ^cannot determine, the place of the
ship on the heaving sea except by reference to
the immoveable sun, so we find it impossible
to determine the state of the soul without
something outside, some fixed idea, as that of
God.

• •

I would ask. What is God ? with that awe
which becomes a man in this inquiry. It is no
idle curiosity. It Is what we were made for. The
answer we offer to the question is always an un-
erring index of the purity of our religious views.
A savage will, make one /eply, a sage another,
an angel another ; and, as their views of God
are, their views of man and of duty will be. . . .

JOURNAL

[Aob 24

238

ANECDOTE OF MR. OTIS AND JUDGE SPENCER

(

Divinity 'hiM.hy March 10, 1828.

V. . . If you are in habits of intimacy with
men, you have sometimes known two of your
friends come to you at different times, and each,
giving the character of the other, lament that he
had not judgment. The fact probably was that
both were right, for both wanted it. Judge
Spencer of New York (who was left out in- the
new modelling of the courts in that State) told
Judge Lyman that Mr. Otis came to see him on
his way from Washington, and “I s-’id to him,
* Well, my old friend, we are both disappointed
— I have fallen and you have failed to rise * —
and I was very much mortified to have said this,
for i found it touched Mr. Otis to the quick.”
Shortly after Mr. Otis came to Northampton
and dined with Judge Lyman and spoke of this
visit to Spencer and the conversation, and re-
marked, “ that it really made him ashamed to
see how much Judge Spencer was offended by
so trifling a thing as this political disappoint-
ment.” And how was the truth? I inquired of
Judge Lyman ; “ O,” said he, “both felt it very
much.”

TRUE RELIGION

239

igaS]

[^OFFICE OF religion]

. . . Men entertain very gross prejudices touch-
ing the very nature of Religion. I speak . of
good plausible people that go to church f6r de-
cency’s sake, but do not obey the commandments,
nor observe the ofdinances. They think it is a
train of splegin pageants that we wish them to
entertain in the mind, to lengthen the visage, to
make long prayers, to read long sermons, — and
not to fulfil their duties to the Universe. They
are living. All the true aim of Religion is to set
them right, enlighten them. They are on a wrong
scent; they^are undoing themselves; they are liv-
ing animals. We would have them live like
men. They are acting for thirty or forty years. We
would have them act as century-plants. Tlfty are
scheming and talking, as if they belonged, like a
toad or a ground-worm, to the acre on which they
were born : they never leave the shop, they are
village statesmen, cob-house architects ; we have
found out that, though in the disguise of these
rags, they are come of an imperial family ; that
they are heirs of heaven and earth ; tidings have
come full ofaetonishmenjand transport that their
life, that seemed running fast to the last sands,
is to be prolonged by a decree of Omnipotence ;

240 JOURNAL [Aob 24

that it is not to be wasted any more in low places,
but they are to be removed, to the company of
majestic minds and an infinite spectacle ; that they
are now to owe duties to the Sovereign of the
Universe and to all the vast circle of intelligent
beings.

Observe : — A prejudice exists that we would
call them to a life oi contemplation^ and the nature
of man demands a life of action. They would have
reason. But it is not so. W e call them to a life pf
action. We understand their ignorance. We find
unutterably dear and beautiful what they es-
teemed, and what we once esteemed,,, sad and
tragic. Joy is grave.

\Religio non solum] ad delectationem^ sed ad
animi magnitudinem^ et ad mores conferat.

[Bacon] De Augmentatione Scientiae, Lib. ii ;
cap. 13.

(From ** Sermons and Journals.’')

[do not over-rate action]

We are very apt to over-rate the importance
of our actions. Men of a very religious turn of
mind are apt to think . (at least tb,e’r language
gives this impression) that the designs of God
in the world are very much affected [by], if not

1828] GOD THE PILOT 241

>

dependent upon what shall be done or deter-
mined by themselvps, or their society, or their
country. We lose ourselves in the details of the
prejudice, till we are blind to the absurdity ^hat
we are making the everlasting progress of the
universe hang upon the bye-laws of a Mission-
ary Society or a Sunday School.

The true way to consider things is this : Truth
says, Give yourself no manner of anxiety about
events, about the consequences of actions. They
are really of no importance to us. They have
another Director, controller, guide. The whole
object of the universe to us is the formation of
character. If you think you came into being for
the purpose' of taking an important part in the
administration of events, to guard a province of
the moral creation from ruin, and that its sdlva-
tion hangs on the success of your single arm, you
have wholly mistaken your business. Creep into
your grave, the universe hath no need of you.
H ow foolish ! For what hast thou which thou
didst not receive? and cannot He who gave you
this power commit it to another, or use it himself?

It is proppged as a question, whether the busi-
ness of the preacher is not simply to hunt out
and to exhibit the analogies between moral and

2^2 JOURNAL [Agb zj

material nature in such manner as to have a bear-
ing upon practice.

[inspiration]

Concord, May, 1828.

... I find a kindling excitement in the thought
that the feeling which prompts a child to an act
of generosity is the same which guides an arch-
angel to his awful duties; that in the humblest
transaction in w'hich we can engage we can intro-
duce these stupendous laws which make the sov-
ereignty of the creation, the character of God. It
seems to me, in obeying them, in squaring my
conduct by them, I part with the weakness of
humanity. I exchange the rags of my nature for
a portion of the majesty of my Maker. I am
backed by the universe of beings. I lean on
omnipotence.

FRIENDS

The character of our friends is a sacred pro-
perty which is very important to us. . . . In mo-
ments when our own faith wavers, when we are
disturbed with melancholy doubts, the unfailing
refuge of the mind is in that little hqppured num-
ber of good men and women among our friends,
whose probity is our anchor, that, like a squad-

SILENCE

i8z8]

H3

)

ron of angels, gather on the mount before us and
send out from their seraph faces courage and light
into our hearts.

There is something respectable in being mas-
ter of the tongue. . . . Consider the force of
character ; the impressiveness of the silence of a
good man. I have known a pause in speech do
more than a harangue. Consider also the benefi-
cent consequences of collecting and reporting the
good of all men.

[writing dow'n]

Divinity Hall, July lo, 1828.

I am always made uneasy when the conversa-
tion turns in my presence upon popular ignorance
and the duty of adapting our public harangues
and writings to the mind of the people. 'Tis all
pedantry and ignorance. The people know as
much and reason as well as we do. None so quick
as they to discern brilliant genius or solid parts.
And I observe that all those who use this cant
most, are such as do not rise above mediocrity
of understanding.

244

JOURNAL

[Age 25

[SAUNTERINGSJ

I am not so enamoured of liberty as to love
to.be idle. But the only evil I find in idleness is
unhappiness. I love to be my own master, when
my spirits are prompt, when my brain is vegete
and apt for thought. If I were richer, I should
lead a better life than I do ; that is, better di-
vided and more able. I should ride on horseback
a good deal ; I should bowl, and create an appe-
tite for my studies by intermixing some heat and
labour in affairs. The chief advantage I should
propose myself in wealth would be thaindepend-
ence of manner and conversation it would be-
stow and which I eagerly covet and seldom quite
attain, and in some companies never.

It is a peculiarity (I find by observation
upon others) of humour in me, my strong pro-
pensity for strolling. I deliberately shut up my
books in a cloudy July noon, put on my old
clothes and old hat and slink away to the
whortleberry bushes and slip with the greatest
satisfaction into a little cowpath where I am
sure I can defy observation. This point gained,
I solace myself for hours with picking blueber-
ries and other trash of the woods, far from fame,
behind the birch-trees. I seldom enjoy hours

i8»8] EDWARD B. EMERSON 245

as I. do these. I remember them in winter;
I expect them in spring. I do not know a
creature that I think has the same humour,
or would think it respectable. Yet the friend,
the anteros, whom I seek through the world,
now in cities, now in wilderness, now at sea,
will know the delight of sauntering with the
melancholy Jaques.

When I consider the constitutional calamity
of my family, which, in its falling upon Edward,
has buried at once so many towering hopes —
with whatever reason,! have little apprehension
of my own liability to the same evil. I have so
much mixture of silliness in my intellectual frame
that I think Providence has tempered me against
this. M y brother lived and acted and spoke with
preternatural energy. My own manner is .^ug-
gish; my speech sometimes flippant, sometimes
embarrassed and ragged ; my actions (if I may
say so) are of a passive kind. Edward had alw'ays
great power of face. I have none. I laugh; I
blush; I look ill-tempered; against my will and
against my interest. But all this imperfection, as
it appears to me, is a caput mortuunty is a ballast
— as things go, is a defence.

My practice conforms more to the Epicurean,
than to the Stoic rule,

246 JOURNAL [Agb 2 $

“ I will be flesh and blood ;

For there was never yet philosopher
That could endure the toothache patiently.
However they have writ the style of gods
^nd made a pish at chance and sufferance.”

Wo is me, my brother, for you! Please God to
rescue and restore him I *

EDUCATION

I like to have a man’s knowledge compre-
hend more than one class of topics, one row of
shelves. I like a man who likes to see a fine ,barn
as well as a good tragedy.

Sir Henry Wotton says of the in,stitutions of
Education, that they are more important than
the laws, because, if young trees were at first well
fastened at the root, they would little want any
props and fence afterwards. He says also, by an
analogy perhaps not so natural, that if such an
unpliant and stubborn mineral as iron is will
acquire by continuance a secret appetite, an
habitual inclination to the site it held before,

1 Edward’s reason temporarily gave way because his con-
science and his ambition spurred him to labours too great for
his high-strung organization u stand. See in Ehicrson’s Poems,
*<In Memoriam, E. B. E,,” and the Dirge”; alto in
Cabot’s Memoir, voL i, pp. 140, 141.

1828] EDWARD’S SERMON 247

hoy much more may we liope through [the]
same means, — education being nothing but a
constant plight and inurement, — to induce,
by custom, good habits into a reasonable crea-
ture ? — See Survey of Education.

He has two or three signs among children ;
Tantum ingenii quantum /Vac, Seneca; another,
tum ingenii quantum memoriae, Quintilian; a third,
tantum in^enti quantum imitationis, Aristotle.

I do not love to be punctual because I love
to be punctual.

SKETCH FOR A SERMON, BY E. B. E.

You are i son, and certain conduct you per-
ceive to belong to you in this relation. You are a
brother, and such and such duties, e^c. YdU are
a merchant. You belong to this city, and [it is]
this or that in the deportment which makes up
your virtue or your vice in your character as
citizen. One step farther; you belong to this
country as a confederacy of States, and hence
come other new obfigations. Farther still, you
belong to mankind, and, as a man,^owe some-
thing. But;i§ this all ? — ^You belong to one still
more extensive family, brotherhood, community
— the universe.

248

JOURNAL

[Age 25
July 30, 1828.

A child is connected to thewomb of its mother
by a cord from the navel. So, it seems to me, is
man connected to God by his conscience. God
has given him a free agency, has permitted him
to work his will in the world — doing wrong or
right, but has kept open this door by which he
may come in at all times and visit, his sins with
distress, or his virtues with pleasant thoughts.
It is like the hydrostatic paradox, as naturalists
call it; the ocean against a hair line of water;
God against a human soul.

Est deus in nobisy etc., and, when outraged, this
deus becomes diaboJuSy a spectre that no exorcism
will bind.

' Divinity Hall, August 18, 1828.

Keep a thing by you seven years, and you shall
find use for it. You will never waste knowledge.
I like the sentence of Locke; “ that young men
in their warm blood are often forward to think
that they have in vain learned to fence, if they
never show their skill in a duel.”

One of tjie great defects of the world is this,
that it is not enough that an objecfjon has been
fully answered. In my simplicity I should have
thought Richardson’s engaging novel of Sir

I8a8] POWER OF MIND 249

Charles Grandison a settlernent of the subject of
duelling: that all the common prejudices on that
question were manifestly shown to be paltry. But
no, it must be hammered into the head of, so-
ciety, as Latin nouns into the head of a block-
head at school.

October 31, 1828)
February i\y 1828.')

[self reliance]

It is better to depend on yourself and set at
novght the judgment of society. . . . Is it not
better to* get out of the vapours that settle in this
low air, its deceptive echoes,*its false valuations,
and sketch the map of the country from moun-
tain ground? Is it not better to scorn and^void
the heaving fluctuations of its public opinion,
refuse to be the victim of its changing estima-
tion, and be all the universe to yourself?

Divinity Hall, September ii.

We are very powiyful beings. Every mind may
be brought to such a state as to have very lit-
tle regard to inconvenience or physical obstruc-
tions. Let*if[ . . • ] be felt by us that we exist

I Here follow two passages written in cipher.

250 JOURNAL [Acb *5

wholly in the mind ; that all happiness is thpre,
and all unhappiness; that the present condition
and appearance is nothing. . . .

SITUATION

’T is a striking proof of the power of situa-
tion to drop a penknife or a glove upon the
ground and see how they look there.

[compensation]

It is an important fact that a man carries about
with him favour or disgrace. We impute our
reception in society to the will of others and
forget that we ourselves alone determine what
that reception shall be, that a man may always,
before he enters the door of a house, forestal his
welcome by consulting his own mind. It will
render him a true and faithful reply. . . .

Do you not see that every misfortune is mis-
conduct, that every honour is desert, that every
affront is an insolence of your own ?

Don’t you see you are the universe to your-
self? You carry your fortunes in your own hand.
Change of olace won’t mend the matter, you will
weave the same web at Pernambufo as at Bos-
ton, if you have only learned how to make one
texture. . . .

I8z8] MIND— -BOOKS— JUSTICE 251

He that explores the pAnciples of architec-
ture and detects the beauty of the proportion of
a column, what doth he but ascertain one of the
laws of his own mind ? The Kingdom of God is
within you.

If you 'stammer in your talk or are cloudy,
why then it is because your purpose is not pure.
If the plan you explain is high-minded, generous
on your j^art* why, then the reason you stammer
is^ because you tell it to get credit for your mag-
nanimity.

[reading]

f read things in Montaigne, Caius, that you
cannot ; much as he said himself. I will give you
Scougal and you shall not ^nd anything in it
valuable to you. “It sounds to the intelligent.” *
The lapidary will let you choose a stone fyom a
handful of chrystals, knowing that your eye is not
skilful enough to detect the unpolished diamond.

I believe the law of Justice is very hard to
keep. As to Charity, you can’t help being chari-
table. It is easier to give than it is to withhold on
twenty occasions. But Justice lasts all the time,
and never mitigates her claim, and, after all, is a
pitiful performance, for it never deserves praise.
You can only sing, We are unprofitable servants.

I Pindar.

2g2 JOURNAL [Age 15

In a tavern everybody puts on airs except the
landlord: he is the poor devil, and the com-
monest sot of a teamster thinks he has the ad-
vantage of him.

[beauty]

It is hard to yoke love and wisdom. It is hard
to criticize the behaviourof Beauty. In her magic
presence, reason becomes ashamed of himself
and wears the aspect of Pedantry or Calculation.
Sentiment triumphs, . . . quotes triumphantly
the ancient theory (a sweet falsehood) that Beauty
is the flower of Virtue. Experience looks grave,
and though when the radiant eye peeps out upon
him, he stands half convinced, yet still he musters
his saws, his conspiring traditions and rules of the
wise, his observations on the living, his analo-
giespand, what he chiefly relies on, the impres-
sions formerly made on the same heart by other
and loftier qualities which reason and stoicism
justified. A pretty plea, no doubt, but if the
Daemon of the man should throw him into cir-
cumstances favourable to the sentiment, reason
would stand on a perijous;'unsteady footing.

The terms of intercourse in society are sin-
gularly unpropitious to the virtuous curiosity of
young men with regard to the inner qualities of a
beautiful woman. They may only see the outside

i8z8l BEAUTY— ENGLISH POETS 253

of the house they want to Buy. The chance is
very greatly against her possessing those virtues
and general principles which they most value.
J^or they know of what delicacy and rarity is fhe
nature of those fruits, and with what difficult and
long separated steps they themselves reached
them. Yet a mighty testimony is afforded to the
moral harmony of human nature, in the fact that
the deporfhientof a beautiful woman in the pre-
sence of her admirer never offends point blank
against the great laws whose violation would
surely shock him.

t

[XHE^SPLENDOUR OF ENGLISH POETRv]

Is it not tfue, what we so reluctantly hear, that
men are but the mouthpiece of a great progres-
sive Destiny, in as much as regards literartire?
I had rather asked, is not the age gone by of
the great splendour of English poetry, and will
it not be impossible for any age soon to vie with
the pervading etherial poesy of Herbert, Shak-
speare, Marvell, Herrick, Milton, Ben Jonson;
at least to represent Anything like their peculiar
form of ravishing verse? It is the hjead of hu-
man poetry^ ^Horner and VMrgil and Dante and
Tasso and Byron and Wordsworth have power-
ful genius whose amplest claims 1 cheerfully ac-

254 JOURNAL [Age *5

knowledge. But ’t is a pale ineffectual fire v'hen
theirs shines. They would lie on my shelf in un-
disturbed honour for years, if these Saxon lays
stole on my ear. I have for them an affectiona^’o
admiration I have for nothing else. They set me
on speculations. They move my wonder at my-
self. They suggest the great endowment of the
spiritual man. They open glimpses of the
heaven that is in the intellect. When I am
caught by a magic word and drop the book to
explore the infinite charm — to run along the
line of that ray — I feel the longevity of the
mind; I admit the evidence of the immortality
of the soul. Well, as I said, I am afraid the
season of this rare fruit is irrecoverably past;
that the earth has made such a nutation of its
nod€^, that the heat will never reach again that
Hesperian garden in which alone these apricots
and pomegranates grew.

[forgiveness]

Divinity Hall, December 20, 1828.

** Forgive our sins.” \Vere it not desirable that
we should have a guardian angel that should go
on our errands between heaven and earth, that
should tell us how God receives our actions ;
when he smiles and when he frowns ; what peti-

ELLEN TUCKER

1828]

^55

tions he hears with favour, ahd what he rejects ?
Well, we have such a report rendered back to us.
Consider this prayer. Forgive our sins. I believe
^yery man may answer to himself when he jit-
ters this ejaculation, the precise degree of consid-
eration it has received from the Almighty mind.
That consideration depends wholly upon the
sentiment which accompanied the prayer. If
when 1 sa^ Forgive my sins, I am in a frame of
mind that sorrowfully repents of all my perver-
si^j^ if I am struck with a deep and contrite sense
of the enormity of sin ; if I feel the evil of guilt
and the virtue to sin no more, then God hears
me.

Concord, New Hampshire,

December 21 . i8a8.‘

I have now been four days engaged to Ellen
Louisa Tucker. Will my Father in Heaven
regard us with kindness, and as he hath, as we
trust, made us for each other, will he be pleased
to strengthen and purify and prosper and eter-
nize our affection !

[On Edward’s happy recovery of his mental
balance, thcju^h his general health was perma-
nently broken, Waldo took him, for a change,
with him to Concord, New Hampshire, where

256 JOURNAL [Age 25

he had engagements to preach for three Sundays
in December.

In a letter to his brother William, announc-
ing his engagement, he said : “ It is now just i
year since I became acquainted with Ellen . . . ;
but I thought I had got over my blushes and
my wishes when now I determined to go into
that dangerous neighbourhood on Edward’s
account. But the presumptuous man was over-
thrown by the eye and ear, and surrendered at
discretion. He is now as happy as it is sa.^p-i-
life to be. She is seventeen years old, and very
beautiful, by universal consent.” '

A little before this time, Mr. Emerson had
been asked by the Committee of the Second
Church in Boston to become associate pastor,
on -account of the delicate health and need of
travel of the Rev. Henry Ware, Jr., the pastor,
and was considering whether he ought to accept
the call.]

JOURNAL

MmiSTER OF THE SECOND
CHURCH OF BOSTON

JOURNAL XX

1829

(From XVIII/’ 2 d, ‘‘Sermons and Journal,” Cabot’s
S/U and Y)

(From Cabot’s S)

TO ELLEN

thy virgin soul can ask be thine,

BcaunAil Ellen, — let this prayer be mine*
Th^firstfKvotion that my soul has paid
To Wiortal grace it pays to the«, fair maid.

I am Phamourv-s* of thy loveliness,

Lovesick with thja sweetfbeauty, which shall bless
With its glad light my path of life around,

Which now is joyless where thou art not found.
N,ow am I stricken with the sympathy
y hit binds the whok world in electric tic ;

T hail love’s birth within my hermit breast.

And welcome the bright ordinance to be blest.

I was a hermit \t*hom fhc lone Muse cheers,

I sped apart 4y solitary years,

I found no j<iy in woman’s meaning ey#

When Fashi'^n’s merry m<jb were dancing byj
Yet had I read the law all laws above.

Great Nature hath ordained the heart to love ;

258 JOURNAL [Age 25

Yet had I heard that in this mortal state
To every mind exists its natural mate;

That God at first did marry soul to soul,

Though lands divide and seas between them roll.
Then eagerly I searched each circle round,

I panted for my mate, but no mate found.

I saw bright eyes, fair forms, complexions fine.

But not a single soul that spoke to mine.

At last the star broke through the hiding cloud.

At last I found thee in the silken crowd ;

I found thee, Ellen, born to love and shine.

And I who found am blessed to call thee mi"'''.

TO MISS EMERSON
(From “XVIII,” 2d)

January 6, 1829.

My dear Aunt, — You know — none can
know better — on what straitened lines we have
all walked up to manhood. In poverty and
many troubles the seeds of our prosperity were
sown. . . .

Now all these troubles appeared a fair coun-
terbalance to the flatteries of fortune. I lean
always to that ancient superstiticih (if it is such,
though drawn from a wise survey of human
affairs) which taught men to beware of unmixed

18*9] days of prosperity 259

prosperity, for Nemesis k&ps watch to over-
throw the high. Well, now look at the altered
aspect. William has begun to live by the law.
^Edward has recovered his reason and his health.
Bnlkeley was never more comfortable in his*life.'
Charles is prospering in all ways. Waldo is com-
paratively well and^ comparatively successful —
far more so than his friends, out of his family,
anticipated. I^ow I add to all this felicity a par-
ticular felicity which makes my own glass very
mjich larger and fuller. And I straightway say,
Can hold ? Will God make me a brilliant
exce^iortjirs the common or(]er of his dealings
which equalizes destinies? There’s an appre-
hension of reverse always arising from success.
But is it my faul> that, I am happy, and cannot
I trust the Goodness that has uplifted to up-
hold me? In all these considerations I believe
the sentiment of the old hymn is just:

In every joy that crowns my days,

In every pain I bear,

My heaJit shall find delight in praise,

Of seek relief in prayer,**

I Robert Bulj^clcy Emerson, a brother bctv^cn Edward
and Charles ina-tge, though amjfiblc and well behaved, re-
mained childish all his life, supported by his brothers, usually
at the house of some worthy fanner.

26o journal [Acs 25

The way to be sare is to be thankful. I cannot
find in the world without, or within, any anti-
dote, any bulwark, against this fear like this, — j
the frank acknowledgment of unbounded de-
pendence. Let into the heart that is filled with
prosperity the idea of God, and it smooths the
giddy precipices of human oride to a substantial
level, it harmonizes the condition of the indi-
vidual with the economy of tKe universe. 1
should be glad, dear Aunt, that you, who are my
oldest friend, would give me some of your niedi-
tations upon these new leaves of my, .'ortune.
You have always promised me succci , an'’, now,
when it seems to be coming, I chuse tc direct
to you this letter which I enter as a sort of pro-
test against my Ahriman, that, if I am called,
alter the way of my race, to pay a fatal tax for
my good, I may appeal to the sentiment of col-
lected anticipation with which I saw the ti^e turn
and the winds blow softly from the favouring
west. As Bacon said, "You may know it was my
fate, and not my folly, that brought me to it.”. . .

26 i

1829] THE CALL

a

[aftsr receivihg the call to the second
church]

(From “ Sermons and Journals ”)

Cambridge, Sunday morningy

“January y 1829.

My history has had its important days within
a brief period. Whilst I enjoy the luxury of an
unmeasured affection for an object so deserving
of it all, and who requites it all, — I am called by
an. ancient and respectable church to become its
pastor.-’ I recognize in these events, accompanied
as thw ar;^ liy so many additional occasions of
joy in»the condition of my family, — I recognize
with acffte sensibility, the hand of my heavenly
Father. This happiness awakens in me a certain
awe: I^know my imperfections: I know my
ill-deserts ; and the beauty of God makes me feel
my own sinfulness the more. I throw myself with
humble gratitude upon his goodness, I feel my
total dependence. O God direct and guard and
bless me, and thqse and especially hery in whom
I am blessed.

She has th^purity and confiding religion of
an angel. A^e the words common? the words
are true. Will God forgive me my sins, and aid
me to deserve this gift of his mercy?

a62 JOURNAL [Acs 25

Whatis theoffic'e of a Christian minister? *Tis
his to show the beauty of the moral laws of the
universe; to explain the theory of a perfect life
to watch the Divinity in his world ; to detect hiS
footstep; to discern him in the history of 'the
race of his children, by catching the tune from
a patient listening to miscellaneous sounds ; by
threading out the unapparent plan in events
crowding on events. The soldier in the army
does not know the plan of the fight. ....

The world, to the skeptical eye, is without^fotm
and void. The gospel gives a firm dye to the
plan of it. It sho^s God. Find God^.andrjorder,
and glory, and hope, and happiness begin. It is
the office of the priest. . . .

'^[Mr. Emerson was stillconsideringtheaccept-
ance of the call to the Second Church when an-
other serious element was added to the problems.
Signs of consumption appeared in Miss Tucker,
sufficient to cause grave uneasiness. Dr. James
Jackson, the leading physician in Boston, how-
ever, held out hope of her improvement, and so,
after a frapk talk with the committee, Mr. Emer-
son decided to accept the associa^f pastorship.
Ellen seemed to improve much as Spring ap-
proached.

1829] NOVELS 263

Naturally there are few entries in the Journal
^for some time to come. The new life brought
other uses for the hours which for years had been
devoted to writing.l

My weight is 144 lbs.

NOVELS

[Boston] Chardo,n St., July 21.

T.he passion for novels is natural. Every child
asks his Grandpapa to tell him a story. Cinderella
and Red Ridinghood are the novels of the Two-
shoes^, aivl Walter Scott is the grandpa of the
grown «p children.

Ther^appeared in the world, as Civilization
advanced, a marked chacacter which was its crea-
ture — a,fashionist. He never laughs, he never
weeps, is never surprised, never moved. He^
is completely selfish. By his self-command he
aspires to an influence over society which owes
nothing to rank, wealth, office, talents or learn-
ing — the command of fashion. He derides and
is cool, and so re'i^ns. I'his person has been shown
to the public u jfBer several names : Vivvin Grey,
Lord Ktherii^ton, Mr. B^rummel, Lord Dal-
garno, Pelham. But ’t is all one rascal with all his
aliases. Now the question arises whether these

264 JOURNAL [Agk 26

novels of fashionable life, whether these repre-
sentations of this scoundrel, have a good or bad
effect. It is an impertinent question. As long
ar the original exists, the copies will be muld-
pli^d. If the moral is bad, as it is, get rid of‘the
character and the pictures will no more be made.
Therefore let every man cultivate benevolence
in himself.

[fragment]

I am not, I thank the gods,

Born a slave to priests or kings j
Both were bad, but what ’$ the odds
To be the thrtfill of thoughts, or thitigs
There ’s blood alike on crown and mitre** —
Pronounce, who can, which cap is whhcr.

My humour, poor and proud, disdains
The monarch’s crown and friar’s frock ;

My blood shall warm my proper veins
Nor stain the altar or thc^ block.

[To confirm Miss Tucker’s apparently im-
proving health, a driving journey was made in
August ; Mr. Emerson and she’ in one chaise,
her motljer (Mrs. Kent), and hter sister, Miss
Margaret Tucker, in a carriage. J^hey followed
the route chosen by the patient, day by day, rest-
ing as they pleased, from Concord, New Hamp-

1829] DRIVING JOURNEY 265

shire, through Canterbury and Meredith to
Centre Harbor; thence northward to Tam-
jworth under Chocorua, and on to Crawford’s at
the Notch. From there they went to Conway,
and, via Squam Lake, to Plymouth; thence
through Rumney and Wentworth to Hanover,
and, descending the Connecticut Valley to
Springfield, eastward through Worcester to
Boston.

These verses to Ellen, and those which follow
them, were written in September, at Pepperell,
where, no doubt, Mr. Emerson was occupying
the pulpit for a Sunday.]

*; (From Cabot’s U)

Dear Ellen, many a p:olden year
May ripe, then dim, thy beauty’s bloom,
But*never shall the hour appear
In sunny joy, in sorrow’s gloom,

When aught shalV hinder me from telling
My ardent love, all loves excelling.

The spot is ^t in the rounded earth,

In cities va^, in islands lone,

Where I \wll not proclaim thy worthy
And glor)i that thou art |ninc own ;

Will you, nill you, I ’ll say I love thee,

Be the moon of June or of March above thee.

266 JOURNAL [Age 26

And when this porcelain clay of thine
Is laid beneath the cold earth’s flowers,

And close beside reposes mine,

Prey to the sun and air and showers,
il ’ll find thy soul in the upper sphere,

And say I love thee in Paradise here.

I call her beautiful ; — she says
Go to ; your words are idle ;

My lips began speak her praise.

My lips she tried to bridle.

But, Ellen, I must tell you this.

Your prohibition wasted is.

Unless among, your things you find ^

A little jail to hold the mind ;

If you should dazzle out mine eyes, r.

As dimmer suns sometimes have done,

My sleepless ears, those judges wise.

Would say, is the voice of the Peerless Onc^

And if your witchery decree

That my five senses closed should be,

The little image in my soul
Is Ellen out of Ellen’s controul,

And whilst I live in the univ'^rse
I will say 't is my beauty, for*>etter, for worse.

[On the last day of September,* 1829, Ralph
Waldo Emerson was married to Ellen Louisa
Tucker, at the house of Colonel W. A. Kent,

i8i9] THE SWEDENBORGIANS 267

her . step-father j the bridegroom being then
twenty-six years of age, and the bride eighteen.
They immediately began housekeeping in Char-
don Place, in Boston, Madame Emerson living
wfth them.]

(From “ Blotting Book 1829.” Cabot’s Y)
Quantum scimus sumus.

Quid Sumus, et quidnam victuri gignimur.

Persius.

NEW JERUSALEM CHURCH

Chardon St., Qctober 9, 1829.

I aim glad to see that interpretations of Scrip-
ture liPfe those of the New Jerusalem Church can
be accepted in ou*r coipmunity. The most spirit-
ual ant] sublime sense is put upon various his-
torical passages of the New Testament. Thei^i-
terpretation of the passages is doubtless wholly
false. The apostle John in Patmos and our Sav-
iour in his talking, meant no such things as the
commentator sa^s he meant. But the sentiment
which the coiVanentator puts into their mouths
is neverthele® true and eternal. I’he^wider that
sentiment cjin be spread and the more effect it
can have on men’s lives, the better. And if the
fool-part of man must have the lie, if truth is a

268 JOURNAL [Age a6

pill that can’t go d6wn till 't is sugared with su-
perstition, why then I will forgive the last in the
belief that the truth will enter into the soul
natively and so assimilantly that it will become
•part •of the soul and so remain, when the false-
hood grows dry and lifeless and peels oif.

BOOK MEMORANDA

Vide John Smil;h, contemporary of Jeremy
Taylor ;

Huber on Bees and Ants;

Kirby and Spence, Introduction to Ento-
mology ; «

Works of Derham, Niewentiet and Ly'onet;

Coleridge’s Aids to Reflection^ p. 147 ;

Bayle, article “SimonHes ” ;

Pomponatius, Treatise De Fato^ Aids to
Reflections p. 148 ;

H. More’s Antidote to Atheism ;

Dr. Donne’s Sermons.

October 13.

There are people who exist tcTi^ask each other
conundrums, and there are others who avail
themselves of each other’s knowledge to find out
the plan of the solar System ; to such dififerent
uses do we put this social principle.

1829] READING NATURE 269

October ic.

» * • • ^
The way for us to be wise is to foresee the

great tendencies and currents of the universe
in the leanings and motions of the little straws
which our eyes can see. We live among ^:ggs,
embryos and seminal principles, and the wisest
is the most prophetic eye. Thus perhaps we
might find out God’s being from the strong
instinct of*the human soul to worship, from the
magnifying idolatrous propensity we have. A
great man we call a very great man : our friend,
we call the best man ; and that not to others,
for vjvnit^'s sake, but we try, to convince our-
selves that there is something that reaches a lit-
tle beyfend our apprehension in the knowledge,
genius, delicacy, or magnanimity of the frotegie
reputation we take up cudgels for. “It is in
honour of theism,” says Aunt Mary, “that t|^e
effect of strong and exclusive attachment to na-
tural science, that becomes disinterested and free
of interest and fame, has a noble moral effect,
as in case of sorpe German philosophers. Alas
that the religid^is affections should be developed
in idolatry evym of knowledge I ” It would seem
as if the sov^j had been made to go out of itself
to apply itself in all its length and breadth to
something else, that is, to God. Therefore we

ayo JOURNAL [Agk 26

approve when it goes out of itself and does thus
devote itself to friendship or to science ; we ap- ^
prove, for we compare this action with selfish-
ness; but when the idea of God is suggested,
thenf we feel these are but half ; that the act' is
true, but the object is untrue.

prayer'

October 20.

The government of God is not on a plan. —
that would be Destiny ; it is extempore. The
history of the universe is a game of which the
object to be gained is the greatest gqod of the
whole, and is attained by a long series of. inde-
pendent The omniscient Eye mates each

new move from a surveyv,of all the present state
of the game. Hence the efficiency of Prayer.
God determines from all the facts, and my earn-
est desires make one of the facts.

[serenity]

How ridiculous that the follies of the world
should vex you. Thus they bWome part and
parcel of .you, — an excess of tite social prin-
ciple, — too eager and sick a sympathy. Presi-
dents should not take sides in a battle of mos-
quitoes. Say with Plato, “ Do not 1 think things

1 8*91 METAMORPHOSES ayi

unsound becaujic I am unsound?” as the blind
man complained the streets were dark.

[human metamorphosis]

October ^ i .

I am made unhappy by talking with Mr.

, with all his reputed fine feelings and his

profession and his genius. For he scoffs ; slightly
and elegantly, but still ’tis the poison of scoffing,
and hardly can a man believe his immortality
and deride any hallowed thing. “He that con-
temns, &c., has faculties which he has never
used.** We must beware of* the nature of the
spiriajal world. It has this [so] terrible power
of self^change, self-accommodation to whatso-
ever we do, that'Cvi-i’s Metamorphoses take
placecontinually. The nymph whowept became
a fountain ; the nymph who pined became an
echo; I'hey who do good become angels ; they
who do deformities become deformed. We are
not immoveably moored, as we are apt to think,
to any bottoni. ^And if we do wrong, and don’t
succeed, we tVmk we can come back to where
we were. Th-tt where is gone. 1 cannot live over
my childhood. No more^can I do right when I
have vitiated all the springs of feeling and action.
I have no nov arto. I have then no eye to see

272 JOURNAL [Age 26

«

the right, no fingers to feel it. I have only vi-
cious members loving and doing wrong. That
part of us which we don’t use dries up and
pe'rishes.

Nonember 7.

Every man by God’s arrangements whilst he
ministers and receives influence from all others
is absolutely, imperially free. Whet) I look at
the rainbow I find iiiyself the centre of its arch.
But so are you ; and so is the man that sees it, a
mile from both of us. So also the globe is round,
and every man therefore stands on the top.
King George and the chimney-sweep'no^ess.

t

TO MISS EMERSON
(From » XVIU,” 2d)

November 15 [1829?]

They say that the progress of the human mind
is not by individuals, but by society at large; that
the Newtons and Bacons are mountain summits
that catch the sunlight a littlt\earlier, which is
presently visible to all ; so we g^ers are spying
to see if the giants of the generation are not now
bathing in a purer element than we below. It is
surely with no affectation and no good will that
1 suspend my judgment of things so vast, but a

18*9] LETTER TO HIS AUNT 273

static of mind wholly involuntary. All that I see
is full of intelligence and all that I know is my
approximation to the idea of God. When I see
a green lane open, I suppose that however boau-
tljful in itself, with what bluebell and roseAiaries
soever it may be adorned, it leads somewhere, and
in my simple manhood I am still guided by these
old truepenny reasons, all Hume and Germany
to the cdntrary notwithstanding. Then is not
oije amazed, if amazement it be, which is rather
calm delight — to find, as he goes on, how per-
fectly the moral laws hold, how they pervade with
their* delicate and subtle divinity all human life
— how truly too the material creation seems to
be thdlr shadow and type, by its faithful analo-
gies (the mind does not manufacture, but finds
them)^. Then every man’s life is to him the idea
of a Providence. And moments are marked in Jiis
memory of intercourse with God. Well now, if
he have sense, he must see that where all is so
wondrous, a miracle is no more, and a revelation
of immortality, no more strange than his percep-
tion of its pn'.bability.

I think thus and so, receive the dispensation
gladly, but with my own interpretations, not
thinking it becoming or possible to give up the
certainty of natural reason for the highest un-

274 JOURNAL [Acs 26

certainties, when at 'the same time ’tis so easy to
account for the imperfect transmission of the re-
velation. But when you ask, What is God — I
must answer with Simonides : The finite cannot
comprize the infinite; we have faculties to per-
ceive his laws, but himself how obscurely. He
can be nothing less than our highest conception,
and our conceptions continually soar higher —
both the man’s and the age’s. So that the best
man of our time is a nobler moral exhibition than

<4

the God of a much ruder time. We need not fear
what Time may teach us, for that which is true
must be that which is most desirable ; — because
that which is true must be fittest for our nature,
since all that exists is mutually conformed. At
least we may gather so much pi ophecy from our
inward informations.

PERSEVERANCE
(From Cabot’s /)

December 7 .

Habit is the succour God .spds in aid of
Perseverance, that is, he decreesuhat what you
have done laboriously you shall do easily. The
great majority of men are bundle^s of begin-
nings. . . . Some very unseasonable circum-
stances occurred and the good purpose was

HELP OF HABIT

1829J

275

postponed. Who is there here who does not
remember his defeats ; who that does not own
himself the cause ? The world is full of slippery,
imbecile, undetermined persons, who carry a
ccfwardice in their bosoms that invites attack.
Here and there is a Hercules who persists in his
purposes. ... He cannot fail. If all the uni-
verse oppose^he cannot fail. For the stake is
nothing ; fhe skill of his game is all. The soul
he, has made unconquerable, and so, at death,
it bursts into eternity, like a God to win worlds.
One of the reasons why perseverance hath such
potency because it gains by littles, and life is
made, up of littles, and happiness.

Everything has its price. Little goods are
lightly gained, bat the rich sweets of things are
in the ribs of the mountain, and months and
years must dig for them. For example, a jest pr
a glass of wine a man can procure without much
pains to relieve his trouble for a moment ; but
a habit of patience^ which is the perfect medicine,
he cannot procure in a moment or a week or a
month. It wilf'cost thought and strife and mor-
tification and prayer.

In some of the foreign manufacturing towns
steam power is generated and vended in amounts

276 JOURNAL [Ace 26

to suit very difFererft purposes. I conceive every
man to be such a shop. His conversation and ^
works in the world do generate a certain amount
of,. power, which he applies here to certain ob-
jects'; but these objects are arbitrary and thtey,
are temporary, will soon be removed, and he
will be called on to apply the same habits, i. e.,
steam power, to new uses, and very different
ones in heaven.

Give your good project a fair trial, a year,
two years. It is of small matter if it should
prove on the whole inexpedient. It has dopej'oa
good, if it has not mankind ; and so has given
the state a better citizen for its next occasions.

TO MISS EWTfiRSON

Boston, December 10, 1829.

1

Mv DEAR Aunt, — I hear nothing from you,
though I sent an almost immediate answer to
your catechism. You asked about the knee. I said
nothing, for it was no better. Now ’t is well, or all
but well. I have walked far andUide to-day. A
quack doctor, the pupil of Sweet, has cured me,
and that in two or three hours. IJis name is
Hewitt. He still attends me every evening, and
will come presently, so my pen must scamper.

1829] LETTERS — COLERIDGE 277

I am reading Coleridge’s Triend with great in-
terest. You don’t speak of it with respect. He
has a tone a little lower than greatness — but
what a living soul, what a universal knowledge !
I ‘like to encounter these citizens of the uniVerse,
that believe the mind was made to be spectator
of all, inquisitor of all, and whose philosophy
compares with others much as astronomy with
the other sciences, taking post at the centre and,
as, from a specular mount, sending sovereign
glances to the circumference of things. There
is an affectation of emphasis and typography, —
a nobleqjan don’t care how l^e looks ; but there
are a«good many of these Rousseaus in the world
whose^wo eyes are one a microscope and t’other
a telescope. Buf* there are few or no books of
pure literature so self-imprinting, that is so often
remembered as Coleridge’s.

Sunday night, 13.

I have got your letter and perhaps will try
to answer it. But what a fight all our lives long
between prurfence and sentiment; though you
contradicted once when I tried to make a sen-
tence, that Jife was embarrassed by prudentials.
The case in point is this* — My soul is chained
down even in its thoughts, where it should be

278 JOURNAL [Ace 26

freest lordliest. The Christmas comes, a hal-
lowed anniversary to me as to others, yet am. I
not ready to explore and explain the way of the
star-led wizards — am looking at the same Truth
which they sought, on quite another side and
in novel relations. I could think and speak to
some purpose, I say, if you would take what I
have got, but if I must do what seems so proper
and reasonable, — conform to the occasion, —
I can only say what is trite, and will, ’t is likely,
be ineffectual. This is a very disadvantageous
example of that warfare that is in all profes-
sional life between the heroical and the^ proper.

People wag their heads and say, I can't under-
stand Coleridge. Yet it isonly one more instance
of what is always interesting, .the restless hu-
man soul bursting the narrow boundaries of
antique speculation and mad to know the secrets
of that unknown world, on whose brink it is sure
it is standing — yea, can now'and then overhear
passing words of the talk of the inhabitants. I
say a man so learned and a man sq bold, has a right
to be heard, and I will take off my 'hat the while
and not make an impertinent noise. At least I
become acquainted with one new mind I never
saw before, — an acquisition in my knowledge of
man not unimportant, when it is remembered

1829] COLERIDGE— BOOKS 279

that so gregarious are even Intellectual men that
Aristotle thinks for thousands, and Bacon for

f

his ten thousands, and so, in enumerating the
apparently manifold philosophies and forms<of
thought, we should not be able to count \nore
than seven or eight minds. ’T is the privilege of
his independence and of his labour to be counted
for one schooL His theological speculations are,
at least, Qod viewed from one position ; and no
wi§e man would neglect that one element in con-
centrating the rays of human thought to a true
and comprehensiveconclusion. Then I love him
that be is^io utilitarian, nor n^essarian, nor scof-
fer, rvor hoc genus omne^ tucked away in the corner
of a sentence of Plato.

USES OF BIOGR'APHY AND HISTORY

December 12.,

Pericles is made noble and Luther indomit-
able to show Canis and Aspen their capabilities.
Instead of generating complaint, it should beget
all hope.

Authors or Books mentioned or quoted
IN Journals of 1828 and 1*829

Homer; AnaximandSr, apud De Gerando;
Simonides ; Democritus ; Socrates ; Plato ;

a8o JOURNAL [Age 26

Virgil; Persius;* Juvenal; ^Plutarch, Lives
and Morals ; Saint Augustine, Confessions; •

Dante; Montaigne, Essays; Tasso;

Shakspeare; Ben Jonson; Bacon, De ^ug-
ment\itione Scientiae ; Sir Henry Wotton, Suriiey ^
of Education; Herrick; Herbert; Milton;
Marvell; Saint-fivremond, of an Honest
and Experienced Courtier ;

Locke; Newton; Scougal, Life 'of God in
the Soul ;

Young ; Pope, Essay on Man ; Samuel Rich-
ardson, Sir Charles Grandison ;

Spence, Anecdotes y Observations and Charac-
ters ; Butler; Cotton Mzthcr, Essays to do Good ;

Mumc, Essays ; Priestley; Gibbon ; *Paley ;

James Montgomery, The Pelican Island;

Sir James Mackintosh ; Degerando, Deriva-
tion de la Science du Droit ;

Wolf, Prolegomena ad Homerum ; De Stael,
Germany;

Wordsworth, Excursiony Sonnet Sy Diony Inti-
mations of Immortality, etc ; Byron ;

Coleridge, Friend, Literary Biographies, Aids
to Reflection ;

Rev. Henry Ware, Sermon; Re^. Nathaniel
L. Frothingham, Sermon ;

Disraeli, Fivian Grey; Bulwer, Pelham.

JOURNAL XXI

1830

From Y, 'Fj.and Blotting Book IV

[interaction of minds]

(From Y) *

January y 1830.

**The grandest visions external could not be-
come ihteUectual, but by the ciiemistry of those
acquired from the minds of others, — how far
original* inspiration influenced is uncertain, —
as how far a consfant agency in harmony with
the lawj of mind and matter influence at all
times the seeker of moral excellence,"

Aunt Mary.

I read in Plutarch’s Political Precepts, that
when Leo Byzantkius went to Athens to appease
the dissensions in that city, when he arose to
speak, he perceived that they laughed on ac-
count of th% littleness of his stature. “What
would you do,” he exclaimed, “ if you saw my
wife who scarce reaches to my knees?" And

' a82 JOURNAL [Agb 26

they laughing the more he sajd, “Yet as little
as we are, when we fall out, the city of Byzcn-^
tium is not big enough to hold us."

i

It is strange that the greatest men of the thne
only say what is just trembling on the lips of all
thinking men.

January 4, 1830.

Knowledge, eve,n, God’s own attribute and
delight and mean, I fear it is but the cock’s pearl
when it is in a spirit which is not united to the
great spirit, ^antum sumus scimus. It will not
do for us to dogmatize. Nothing i^mere un-
true to nature. The meanest scholar in Christian
practice may often instruct the greatest doctor
both in faith and practice. I ’have no shame in
saying, I lean to this opinion, but am not sure.

I do not affect or pretend to instruct. O no, it
is God working in you that instructs both you
and me. I only tell how I have striven and
climbed, and what I have seen, that you may
compare it with your own observations of the
same object. It is important to have some
formal observer, whether a keen-sighted one
or not, in order to furnish some ttpu o-tw, some
other point to measure thought by.

1830] YOUR OWN THOUGHT 283

That man wijl always speak with authority
wko speaks his own convictions, not the know-
ledge of his ear or eye, i. e., superstitions got in
conversation, or errors or truths remembeited
frdm his reading, but that which, true or lalse,
he hath perceived with his inward eye, which
therefore is true to him, true even as he tells it,
and absolutely true in some element, though
distorted ihd discolored by^ome disease in the
soi\l.

Omnia exeunt in mysterium.

Boston, "January 7, 1830.
**^elle profonde philosophies* says De Geran-
do,' tre supposent pas les legislations de Lycurgue
et de Solon !*’ A specimen, it seems to me, had I
found it elsewhere, of that superficial admiration
which IS so common. Neither Lycurgus ngr
Solon need have been profound thinkers to have
made their respective codes, but only practical,
severe and persevering men. Wonderful capa-
bilities both moral and intellectual, the forma-
tion of a codtf ’does indeed suppose, but in the
general mind of man, and not in the individ-
ual. Lycurgus and Solon were alike in the dark

1 Histoire Compare des Systems de Philosophies par 3f.
De Girando.

284 JOURNAL [Acb 26

with their contemporaries as^ to the extent, or
the order, or the history of those capabilities
which yet their codes recognized, and the com-
mon people they ruled recognized, and Dege-
ran'do recognizes, and I recognize,^ — inevitably
one and all.

Anaximander revives in De Stael, Anaxi-
mander said, “ The infinite is the principle
(principe) of all things.” AnaxagoVas, in De-
gerando, is the model of the true philosopher.

It is the praise of most critics that they have
never failed because they have atte.mpied no-
thing. It is generous in a youthful hero who
bears an unspotted shield to adventure 'his fame
in that difficult field of Metaphysics, where, from
the intrinsic inaccessibilities of the positions, the
strongest and the weakest assailants are brought
nearly to a level, and where much may be gained
by the losses of the individual. He will console
himself, when he comes out smeared and baf-
fled, with the saying of Wotton that ‘‘Critics
are brushers of noblemen’s clothes.”

“ The Eternal hath fixed his «canon ’gainst
self-slaughter,” shall* be my answer to the pyr-
rhonist.

1830] EPITOMIZED THOUGHT 285

The system ,of Aristotle, the labour of a
thousand years, which had become the religion
of the intellect of Europe, comes to be called an
experiment ; some happy genius epitomizes ic* in
a word, and that becomes its history, the alge-
braic X by which it is to be designated, now that
its value has been evolved and that it cannot be
spared more /00m in the opulence of human
knowledge, — repositories jyhere it is huddled
away.

January 18.

“ I am more a Frenchman,” said the Arch-
bishof) ofCambray, “than a Fenelon, and more
a man than a Frenchman.” This is quoted in
Spenc? s Anecdotes to Chevalier Ramsay, who
was secretary toT'enelon.

The greatness of human desires is surely one
element of the greatness of man. The love of
the marvellous, all the fantastic theories of mys-
tics, the deification of the faculties, &c, &c, arc
in that view gjoofd.

Man’s natural goodness is to do good to oth-
ers. Remankable what natural aids there are to
this object. Love of praise strongest in strong-
est minds. If the tree did not bear its drupe, it

286 JOURNAL [Age 26

would perish ; if the animal did not give ovit its
young, it would perish ; if the soul do not bt'atN
its good deed, it will wither and die, it is made
stronger, like the animal muscles, by use. If you
cut off the tree’s leaves and it cannot give out,
its juices to the atmosphere, it dies. If you feed
the horse and not work hipi, he dies. A great
deal of good we can’t help doing. Example is
inevitable. A miser and a sensualist do good
by their hateful example. That ’s a shabby

Janu^ry'^1'1.

The question was debated before the Asso-
ciation this evening, whether we were not required
to abstain from amusements, Innocent to us, if
we think them not innocent to others. The sub-
ject announced was self-denial, and the instance
perpetually quoted was the Theatre. I think
that self-denial is only one form of expression
for perfection of the moral character. It means
the denial of self-indulgences. It means the sub-
ordination of all the lower parts of man’s nature
to the higher, so that the individual doth no-
thing contrary to reason. Well, such a person
cannot do wrong. He is that pure man to whom
all things are pure. If such a person finds it any

1830] SELF-DENIAL — EXAMPLE 287

time ^ his duty to, go to the theatre, he will go
^riwre unchecked by fear of what harm his ex-
ample may do. It is not very likely he will ever
want to go there, for any good now, or in pzst
finfe, apparent on the stage ; but if he do, he
must go. Nor will he do any harm. His exam-
ple will never be qpoted hna fide by any who
goes with evil iptentions. His going there cannot
be mistakeh. A self-denier creates a moral at-
mosphere about him, which sanctifies and sepa-
rates Nb actions. One part of his example
interprets another part of his example. He may
safely firuat his virtue to bear, itself out in the
world# Our Saviour sat with sinners, yet none
ever thcfught of quoting him as sanctioning sin.
What, then, mat we be so free? And is
nothing,due to the judgments of others? No,
not anything to the judgments of others, ev
cept as a commentary, an expositor frequently
useful in bringing out the true sense of our own.
Not anything to the judgments of others, but
much, very muclr more, to our own than we
are accustomed to give them. The true pinch
of the question is that there is almost no such
thing as this«elf-denial. It is not that men are
careless of their influence on other men, but
that they are careless of their own action.

288 JOURNAL [Ace 26

Chemistry begaA by saying^^ it would change
the baser metals into gold. By not doing tfe^t-,.
it has done much greater things. Solon said, He
thjit has better iron shall have all this gold. In
modfern times the best iron-manufacturing fta-^
tions are the most civilized and run away with
all the gold.

Objection to the subject of Providence that
’tis too vast for human optics; pick up l^ere
and there a pebble contrivance, and say^See ! a
God! as Newton thought. E,very one of these
instances valuable^. Five or six facts, yidtpend-
ently of almost no value, made the discovery of
America in Columbus’s mind, and it look as
many centuries to accumulate* them. One man
sees a fact and secures it, which is to him alto-
gether frivolous, but inestimable to the race,
when seen in connexion with another fact not
known for one hundred years after. Facts seek
their inventions, happy marriage of fact to fact.

•

Sir Isaac Newton, a little before’he died, said :
“ I don’t know what I may seem to the world, but
as to myself I seem to have been onjy like a boy
playing on the sea sh&re, and diverting myself
now and then finding a smoother pebble or a

1830] RELIGION SUBLIMED 289

prettier shell than ordinary, wiiilst the great ocean
^>£ 4 ruth lay all undiscovered before me.”

February 3.

“ The greater God is, the greater we are.
Isomer was not grand in making his gods so
mean.” Aunt Mary.

February 10.

Is there not the sublime always in religion?
I go down to the vestry and I find a few plain
men and women there, come together not to eat
or drinjc, or get money, or mirth, but drawn by
a great thought. Come thither to conceive and
form a ^connexion with an infinite Person. I
thought it was suljlime, and not mean as others
suppose.

“ The miraculous,” says Sampson Reed,* “ fs
the measure of our departure from God.” And
Brown says to the selfsame purpose, that the
miraculous is no violation of the laws of nature,
but a new agent interposes, dignus vindice nodus.

I Mr. Emerson’s Swcdenborgian friend.

2po JOURNAL [Ace *6

(

[creeds grow from the S'fRUCTURE OF THE
creature]

February ii.

Every man makes his own religion, his own
God, his own charity ; takes none of these from
the Bible or his neighbour entire. All feel that
there is something demanded by the mind
stronger and wiser than itself ; that it is a thing
essentially imperfect, that in its very structure
demands more, as one half a pair of scissors, one
sex, or a babe, and so every human creature
makes its Jove, its Josh, its fairy, or amulet.
Having got this thought well shaped and ac-
commodated to their other knowledge 'they are
easy, they are stronger than before, they will do
wonders. If this idea is disturbed they are made
uncomfortable, sometimes furious, sometimes de-
praved, sometimes dejected. Well then, it. would
seem that this idea is pointed at in all the struct-
ure of the animal, man. As nothing, it is dis-
covered, is made without a meaning, — no hands,
no intestines, no antennae, no hair, without a
distinct purpose disclosed as we study it, well
then, is this leaning without a purpose, this
inevitable, essential, natural prayer of all intelli-
gent nature, without purpose ? Is it not a finger

1830] PETTY PROVIDENCES 291

pointing straight upwards at the Great Spirit ?
•^Rienit is found that this superstition is cleansed
into religion as the mind is informed.

The belief in God being thus gotten, Provi-
dence is tlje application of that belief to the
government of the world. Just as great, or as
little, as is the idea of God, just such is their
opinion of Pi;ovidence. The pagan believes in a
little, jealbus, snarling patj-onage that reaches
hina and his family and hates everybody else. It
knows a little more and does a little better than
a man. One god thwarts another, as man con-
tends *with man. The superstition of the fairies
is the* idea of a petty Providence. As his know-
ledge dhlarges, that is, as his mind applies itself
to a larger piece 6f the universe, he sees the un-
broker\ prevalence of laws ; the grass grows in
Bengal by the same order as in Massachusetts,
the man of one district fears death like the man

m

of the other, and knows what it is to love and
to have and to want. . . .

Dr. Donne’ saith, “ Encourage the catechizer
as well as the curious preacher. Look so far to-
wards your way to Heaven, as to the Firmament,
and consider there that*the star by which wt
sail and make great voyages is none of the stars

292 JOURNAL [Ace 26

of greatest magnitude, but yet it is none of the
least neither, but a middle star. Those preacha :
’which must save your souls are not ignorant, un-
learned, extemporal men, but they are not over
curious men neither. Your children are you, and
your servants are you ; and you do not provide
for your salvation if you provide not for them
who are so much yours as that thev are you. No
man is saved as a good man, if he be’ not saved
as a good father, and as a good master, if God
have given him a family.” Five Sermons^ p. 66.

February^ 24.

We are, by dint of self-command on one hand
and omniscience on the other, as if a dfad wall
were built on one side of our plot of ground, and
on the other it was not fenced by so much as a
stake or a pin from the boundless expanse. A
cunning dissimulator may shut out man’s eye
from so much as a glance at his thoughts, but
God and all angels behold him on the spiritual
side.

February 16.

Whether, saith Ellen, the spirits in heaven look
onward to their immortality as we on earth, or
are absorbed in the pr^ssent moment ?

ELLEN

293

1830]

[Because, in spite of all hope and tender care,
health of his young wife was failing, Mr.
Emerson took her southward in early March,"
accompanied by her sister. Mr. Ware meanwlyle
had gone abroad and all the duties of pastof and
preacher devolved upon Mr. Emerson. It is
probable that he had to leave Mrs. Emerson
with her sister and return to his post for a time.
The poem.“ To Ellen at the South ” was written
a year earlier, April, 1829, and probably also
“ Thine Eyes Still Shined.” Two of her poems,
“ The Violet” and one entitled “ Lines written
by Ellen Louisa Tucker,” were printed by Mr.
Emerson in the Dial ten years or more after her
death. •They are included in the Centenary Edi-
tion of the Poems. The following lines were
probably written in 1830.]

And, Ellen, when the greybeard years
Have brought US' to life’s evening hour,

And all the crowded Past appears
A tiny scene of sun and shower,

Then, if I read the page aright

Where Hope, the soothsayer, reads our lot,

Thyself 8halt own the gage was bright,—

Well that we loved, wo had we notj

294 JOURNAL [Age 26

When Mirth ii dumb and Flattery ’s fled.

And mute thy music’s dearest tone.

When all but Love itself is dead.

And all but deathless Reason gone.

PREACHING

February 28.

Hudibras says,

“ Rhymes the rudder are of verses,

With which, like ships, they steer their courses.”

It is not very much otherwise in preaching.
Topics are the masters of the preacher. He can-
not often write in the way he deems, best and
most level with life. He is obliged to humour his
mind in the choice and the developmerit of his
subject. When the sermon is* done he is aware
that much of it is from the purpose, . . . and
altogether it is unworthy of his conception of a
good sermon. But to-morrow is Sunday. He
must take this, or write worse, or have nothing.
He hopes beside that parts of this discourse will
reach all, and all of it touch or instruct individ-
uals.

PRAYER

What is prayer ? It is the expres^on of human
wishes addressed to 'God. What is God? The
most elevated conception of character that can be

1830] CONVERSE WITH GOD 295

formed in the mjnd. It is tRe individual’s own
•^ul carried out to perfection. For no other Deity
can he conceive. He ;s infinite as I am finite;
he is sinless as 1 am sinful; he is all wise as I«m
air ignorant. He is strong as I am weak, ^ell,
now prayer is the effort of the soul to apply
itself in all its length and breadth to this sover-
eign idea, is [he attempt to bring home to the
thoughts ^o grand a mind ^nd converse with it,
as jve converse with men. . . .

Burke said, “If I borrow the aid of an equal
understanding, I double my own; if of a higher,
I rais^ nw own to the stature of that I contem-
plate/’ Well now, what must be the effect, judg-
ing frofn this plain analogy, of conversing with
one who is whoHy pure and benevolent, and
whom y/e know we cannot deceive ? It seems to
me plain that we must grow godlike.

WEBSTER

March 3.

Read with admiration and delight Mr. Web-
ster’s noble speech in answer to Hayne. What
consciousness of political rectitude, and what con-
fidence in his intellectual treasures must he have
to enable him to take tHis master’s tone ! Mr.
Channing said he had great “self-subsistence.”

296 JOURNAL [Acb 26

c

The beauty and dignity of the* spectacle he ex-
hibits should teach men the beauty and dignity
of principles. This is one that is not blown about
by'eKery wind of opinion, but has mind great
enough to see the majesty of moral* nature and
to apply himself in all his length and breadth to
it and magnanimously trust, thereto.

*

, Wednesd&y night.

The power that we originate outlives us, takes
imposing and stable forms, and Caesar becomes a
dynasty ; and Luther and Calvin each a Church ;
and Mahomet represents himself in a tliird of
the human race.

April 24.

Noah Ripley, the good deaicon, is himself an
affecting argument for the immortality of the
scul.

May 12.

It was said of Jesus that “he taught as one
having authority,” a distinction most palpable.
There are a few men in every age, I suppose, who
teach thus. Stubler the Quaker, whom I saw on
board the boat in Delaware Bay, was one. If
Sampson Reed were a talker, he were another.
There is nevertheless a foolish belief among
teachers that the multitude are not wise enough

iSjoj ONE HAVING AUTHORITY 297

to discern betwe,en good manner and good mat-
ter, and that voice and rhetorick will stand, instead
of truth. They can tell, well enough whether they
have been convinced or no. The multitude »up-
p*ose often j:hat great talents are necessary to pro-
duce the elaborate harangues which they hear
without emotion of consequence, and so they
say, What % fine speaker, What a good dis-
course ; But they will no^ leave any agreeable
enaployment to go again, and never will do a
single thing in consequence of having heard the
discourse. But let them hear one of these God-
tauglft teachers and they surrender to him. They
leave their work to come again ; they go home
and tlfink and talk and act as he said. Men know
truth as quick a% they see it.

It remarkable how this mastery shows it-
self in the tone that is taken, as much as in ^he
facts that are presented. A tone of authority can-
not be taken without truths of authority. It is
impossible to mimick it. There is no favour-
itism in the public. Buckminster had it ; Green-
wood has it m some measure. F m has not

a particle. It proceeds directly from the percep-
tion of priMciples. Dr. Johnson was one.

298 JOURNAL [Age 27

' BrooklinE) June 7.

Conversion from a moral to a religious chaf-
acter is like day after twUight. The orb of the
earth is lighted brighter and brighter as it turns,
until at last there is a particular mopient when
the eye sees the sun, and so when the soul per-
ceives God.

Every man contemplates an angel ■ in his fu-
ture self.

Brookline, June 2, 1830.

. . . what value would belong to every man,
if everyone literajly told his own imnrcfssions
from all he saw, and by the use of his consc'ence
kept himself in the state of an observer. '. . .

[dual consciousness]

Dr. Channing spoke to me of a Frenchman
who had written that there were two souls in
the human body, one which never suspended its
action, and had the care of what we call the in-
voluntary motions, and was, in short, a gentle-
man who knew a good deal of natural magic,
antipathies, instincts, divination and the like ; and
the other, the vulgar, waking, practical soul.
Well, this theory, like all others, is founded on
one glimpse of truth by a cross light. And such

1830] DIPSYCHUS — THE YEAR 299

an intelligence is there in all men, that knows
.>y/hen men speak in simplicity, and when they
speak conventionally. But observe, simplicity of
character is not enough, of itself. All couijtry
people have it in great measures. It needS also
a tender conscience, which shall lead men to
improve themselves, to keep the ear and soul
open to receive truth, and then this straightfor-
wardness ^hall make them act and utter the
truth. . . ,

THE YEAR

The year is long enough for all that is to be
done m jt. The flowers blo>y; the fruit ripens;
and §very species of animals is satisfied and at-
tains ifc perfection, but man does not; man has
seen more than he has had time to do.

What it means to be one with God?

•SOLITUDE

Go sit alone, — for the nations are a handful
compared with that amount of being for whom
the soul consults when she reasons of virtue, —
and see what you can hope to be that is highest
and best. Se^ how goodness is the way to wisdom,
and wisdom is the way to goodness. See how the
soul, in the infinite vista of the future, foresees

300 JOURNAL [Age 27

the hour when it shdll desire nothing wrong, and
therefore nothing false; when, desiring every-
thing right, and everything right being done, it
shaji.l find that insensibly it beats pulse for pulse
with 'the Heart of nature, that all its volitiohs
are followed by instant effects, that it is united
to God.

Is there any hiding of the character of an apple-
tree or of a geranium,, or of an ore, or 6f a horse,
or of a man ? A man is known by the books .he
reads, by the company he keeps, by the praise
he gives, by his dress, by his tastes, by his dis-
tastes, by the storie^ he tells, by his gait, bfy the
motion of his eye, by the look of his house, of
his chamber; for nothing on earth is sdiitary,
but everything hath affinities infinite. . . .

HUMILITY

Brookline, July 15.*

Humility is properly the exaltation of the
Spirit. ... We are to be so humble as to be of the
greatest possible service to all meq. We are to
be always accessible to truth as the proud are

1 After Mr. and Mrs. Emerson’s return home in the early
summer they lived in Brookline for better air (probably board-
ing). Madame Emerson and Mr. Emerson’s brother Charles
were with them.

INDEPENDENCE

1830]

301

not. Yet every sin are we fo scorn with an im-
-.perml superiority. Then to keep an independ-
ence of all men, dazzling men and bad ones,
how hard ! It needs this great equilibrium, .the
relation to^God, which sets all right. For*if we
depend on him for all things, [we] are his chil-
dren. . . .

SELF RELIANCE

Brookline, July zo, 1830.

. . . Milton, Bacon, Bunyan, Scougal, Herbert,
Montesquieu : these are names of good men,
but wha^t dissimilar images do they suggest to
the soul. Now this is not the thought of men,
that to each belongs a separate nature which
must be by him cultivated as an inalienable
estate.^ As they say the vines failed because in
America they wanted to grow madeira wine, jn-
stead of bringing out the native wines, probably
equally good, of this region, so men fail as far
as they leave their native moral instincts in the
admiration of other characters. Let them on the
contrary have greater confidence in the plan, yet
to them unknown, which the moral Architect
has traced for them. . . .

The elm is a bad oak, but a beautiful elm ;
and the beauty of the walnut or the sycamore

302 JOURNAL [Age 27

is not felt by coni’paring them with different
species, but with other individuals of their owrw

The question arises doubtless, Have we not
the power to make ourselves what we will by
steadfast exertions? we do not snuff a scent
that is laid already. We do not grow up like a
plant according to a conformation of a seed. On
the contrary, it is the privilege of cur nature
‘over that of flowers and brutes that we are our
own law.

Brookline, July 24.

Don’t say that qualities are so radical dn us
that the fickle man can never persevere, le^ him
try as he will, nor the selfish man ever distrib-
ute ; for on the contrary, any quality of a man
may be taken advantage of to lead him to any
other that is desirable. I hate steady labour from
morn till night, and therefore am not a learned
man, but I have an omnivolrous curiosity and
facility of new undertaking. In voluntary exer-
tions to gratify it, may I not become learned and
acquire the habits of steady toil?'

[who is religious ?]

It seems to me therr arc degrees in religion,
and much is religion that is not called by that

1830] WHO IS RELIGIOUS? 303

name in minds that do oppose themselves to
what they call religion. A man of honour and
generosity, who would rather die than speak
falsely, has an aversion to religion, treats it x^th
a degree ofjcontempt. Now I think this m*an is
religious, in the lowest degree. What he does
well, he does from his religious nature;

‘‘ Pious beyond the intention of his thought,

Devout beyond the meaning of his wilL”

•

He is in the right way, and far more near,
therefore, to God, than the sensual religionist, as
a cripple Jn the right way will^beat a racer in the
wrong. He is in the right way, and if he con-
tribute*all these generous sentiments in a high
degree, he will continually make atlvancements
unconsciously in religious excellence. He
thinks, perchance, that religion is Calvinism,
and so he hates it. By and by, in consequence
of his efforts at self-knowledge, his mind will
revolve so far that the increasing twilight will
give place to the. Sun, and God will appear as
he is to his s<3ul. I believe it is not a fact that
is very early known to children, that the sun is
the cause of^the day. I am sure I was not my-
self acquainted with it, mnd while living and
growing and playing in his beams, and learning,

304 JOURNAL [Age 27

as all children do, the laws oC light, I did not
imagine to what I was indebted ; and when first*
I was told, it seemed to^me a thing absurd. Is
not this an emblem of the irreligious hero?

Brookline, 3, 1830.

My weight is 157 lbs.

August 18.

r

The sun shines and warms and lights us and
we have no curiosity to know why this is so ;
but we ask the reason of all evil, of pain, and
hunger, and musquitoes and silly people.

t

August 28.

Alii disputent, ego mirabor,s^\A Augnsi'nc. It
shall be my speech to the Calvinist and the
Unitarian.

BUCKMINSTER

September i, 1830.

«

. . . Buckminster went into the pulpit on days
of deepest affliction in his parish for the loss of
excellent persons, with an alacrity and cheerful-
ness in his countenance that would have been
revolting levity in another man, and read psalms
and scriptures of praise. Yet no«one was of-
fended, but all felt thal: the intensity of his emo-
tion was such, and the principle on which it was

1830] ALL SUBJECTS GOOD 305

founded was suchj,as to overAaster their private
thoughts, and the mourner was carried away by
the infection of his subjime joy, from the con-
sideration of his petty griefs.*

3 o does a, man ask himself if his subject be
unseasonable or extravagant ? Let him feel that
none is so unseasonable but the force of his
thinking uponjt will make its excuse. Such is the
intimate cofhnexion existing; between all truth,
that, no topic can be so unusual but a genuine
teacher can show such a practical value in it as
shall command your total attention, and make a
mountiin, before your eyes cyit of a grain of
sand. •

September 3 .

There are two Icinds of pertinence. One to
the circpmstances, and one to the thing itself.
What has been wholly pertinent to one case, (i/i
the second and superior sense) will, I apprehend,
always be found to have a degree of pertinence
to every case. If the orator, as is common,
attends only tQ riie circumstantial pertinence,
if he say. This man had yellow hair, large lips,

1 This is one of the earliest passages in the journal that
appears in his published writings.^ It is found in an improved
form, but without giving the name of the preacher, in ** Elo-
quence,^^ vol. vii, p. 83, of Collected Works, Centenary Ed.

306 JOURNAL [Age 27

long life, or he sptnt on this^ occasion a dollar
and a quarter, or he lived in such a street and
died on such a day, the discourse will not only
bft of necessity wholly impertinent to any other
occ^ion, but, in my judgment, will be really
impertinent to the occasion for which it was*
made. This is a mere carcass of circumstances
destitute of all life and of all use to me.

But if he describe with minutest 'fidelity the
moral portrait of the man, line for line, if he
describe states of mind, the effect of temptation,
and the modes of escape, the more minute his
copying from the^finest shades of thought in his
original, the more deep and universal ai\d per-
manent will the interest of the picture ^become.
And let him change the names, and read it in
Chinese in a bazar at Pekin, and he will find it
i§ pertinent still to the human mind. So much
for the doctrine so much prosed over of perti-
nent preaching.

September 6.

Mon amiea Concord.^

«

[happiness or serenity?]

If a man be asked if he is happy, on his con-
science, he will not affirm it ; he vflll feel a scru-
I Probably Mrs. Emerson had gone to visit her mother and
sister at Concord, New Hampshire. She was now very delicate.

SERENITY

1830]

307

pie, I apprehencj, precisely like that he would
feel if he were about to say that he was sinless.
And is there not any condition of the human heart
when it is esteemed to have reached this climax ?
There is oi\,e remarkable exception ; the state of
religious progress, when a mind that has doubted
of its spiritual safety emerges from the gloom
into a state ofpeace, and says, I am happy. This
is not strict language. I f such a person be strictly
de^t with, it will be found [he has] wants and
imperfections yet. It is a joy and serenity but
not happiness, though I think a nearer approach
to it thap any other circums^nces that can be
named* • • •

What happiness does a man feel uneasiness
about? That which comes to him almost with-
out his exertions, or anyhow which iie feels Jie
has not earned. And as all supereminent pros-
perity has a degree of this want of desert, it is
always dashed with this feeling.

•

•[town and field]

. . . If a man loves the city, so will his writings
love the city, and if a man loves sweet fern and
roams much in the pastures, his writings will
smell of it.

308 journal [Ace

The argument which has not power to, reach
my own practice, I may well fear has not power
to reach yours.

September 8.

Maxima debetur pueris rev&rentia.

September 9.

[balancing]

There are some. kingdoms of Europe whose
whole population for ages does not possess an
equal interest in history with some single minds.
The history of John Locke or of Isaac Newton
is a far more important part of the^ stock of
knowledge than the whole history of Poland
or Hungary. *

Well, what of this.? You accuse yourself per-
haps. Before God, Poland is a greater affair than
Locke.

Mr. Stewart’s works are like Dr. Clarke’s
description of the entrance of Moscow, all splen-
dour and promise till you enter the gate, and
then you look before and behind — but only
cottages and shops.

Judge Howe advistfd his pupils to make study
their business, and business their amusement.

1830]

RESOLVES

309

September 10.

It is my purpose to methodize my days. I
wish to study the scriptures in a part of every
da^, that I may be able to explain them to ofhters
and that their light may flow into my life. I wish
not to be strait-laced in my own rules, but to
wear them easily and to make wisdom master of
them.

It is a resolving world, but God grant me per-
sistency enough, so soon as I leave Brookline,
and come to my books, to do as I intend.

SELF RELIANCE

Brookline, September 27.

I would have a man trust himself, believe that
he has all the endowments necessary to balaqce
each • other in a perfect character, if only he
will allow them all fair play. I have sometimes
wished I had not some acuteness or minuteness
of observation, that seemed inconsistent with dig-
nity of character ; but thus to wish seems to me
now to be false to onc’s-self, to give up a tower
in my castle to the enemy which was given me
as a bulwark of defence, tt is a wondrous struct-
ure, this soul in me, infinitely beyond my art

310 JOURNAL [Ace 27

to puzzle out its principle. I adpiire a flower and
see that each lily and aster is perfect in its kind,
though different in its proportions and arrange-
ment of petals from every other aster in the
field) and shall I not believe as miv:h of every
mind ? — that it has its own beauty and charac-
ter, and was never meant to resemble any other
one? Every man has his own voice, manner,
eloquence, and, just^ as much, his own sort of
love and grief and imagination and action. Let
him scorn to imitate any being, let him scorn to
be a secondary man, let him fully trust his own
share of God’s gopdness, that, correctly used, it
will lead him on to perfection which has no. type
yet in the universe, save only in the’Divme
Mind.

Jt seems to be true that the more exclusively
idiosyncratic a man is, the more general and in-
finite he is, which, though it may not be a very
intelligible expression, means, I hope, something
intelligible. In listening more intently to our
own reason, we are not becoming in the ordin-
ary sense more selfish, but are departing more
from what is small, and falling back on truth it-
self, and God. For it'is when a man does not
listen to himself, but to others, that he is de-

*830] TRUST THYSELF 31 1

praved and misle^. The grerffc men of the world,
the teachers of the race, moralists, Socrates,
Bacon, Newton, Butler, and the like, were those
who did not take their opinions on trust, but
explored thpmselves, and that is the way ethics
and religion were got out.

September 29.

A man is [nvinclble, be his cause great or
small, an abstract principle, or a petty fact, when-
evef he expresses the simple truth. This makes
the cogency of the talk of common people in
common affairs. . . .

It pught to be considered that the meanest
human *soul contains a model of action greater
than is realized by the greatest man. Nobody
can read the life of Newton or Franklin or
Washington without detecting imperfections in
those astonishing instances of the conduct of life.

[virtue must be active]

Boston, October 18.

There is very little enterprize in virtue. When
men take to themselves the reproofs and exhor-
tations of Sciipture, they say, The rule is above
my whole life. The mind 'performs a penitential
act of perceiving its deficiency, but there it stops.

312 JOURNAL [Ace 27

It declares war against the enemy, but it does
not levy a troop nor make an excursion into his
country. It languishes in inaction, and, at the
end of a year, or of seven years, it is found no
better, and therefore far worse than at the be-
ginning — far worse, because the demand runs'
on increasing and the performance does not.

It were better to keep the blood warm with
virtue by some brilliant act. It is as easy and
natural to move, as to rest. Do a deed of char-

r

ity ; persevere to the end of a harassing work.

Better to give every sentiment the body of an
outward action ; as Johnson said, deal soberly
by keeping early hours, righteously by giving
alms, and godly by going early to church : Do-
mestic virtues : Spartan, early rising, &c : temper-
ance, fasting. Newton's mode of succeeding in
his study was always thinking unto it. A gen-
eral attention to a man’s personal habits, the
habit of being sometimes alone, the habit of
reading, the habit of abstraction, in order to
find out what his own opinion is, the habit of
controlling his conversation, the habit of pray-
ing, of referring himself always to God. Order
has a good name in the world for, getting the
most sweetness out ofitime.

1830] THE NIGHTINGALE 313

THE NIGHTINGALe’« SONG

•

The nightingale on her lonely thorn
In great gardens loud complaineth,

And all the woods where the sounds are borne
Are the sphere in which she reigneth
By the empery of sound,

Wide through the dew above and around
The birds lie mute
To his^breithing flute,

And lordly man must linger
•And thank the wondrous singer.

Yet is it inarticulate sound
Nor mortal wit can give it sense.

And bnly heard a mile around ^

Tho)* dusky lawns and hawthorn fence.

But thou, my bird of Paradise — *

FROM BLOTTING BOOK ^

1830

[The following note is written on the cover.]

Population of U. S. A. 12,821,181 souls.

slaveys 2,000,000.

#*

Chardon Street, October 29, 1830.

It has been noticed that all a man’s views are
of a piece. He is a friend*of liberal religion ; he
I This unfinished poem appears to have been original.

314 JOURNAL [Ace 27

will probably be found a friend of free trade,
and of free press, and of free discussion of truth.
On the contrary, is he a bigot? he will contract
hi^s views of education and of politics. This will
happen where interest does not incline him*' to
either side. But the manufacturer may wish a
higher protecting duty in the present circum-
stances^ though, on general questions, he adheres
to the liberal party of the world. The improve-
ment that a man makes in one part of his know-
ledge affects every other part, as the light that
shines on one object illuminates all parts of the
room.

I ^

All a man’s conversation must be tinged by
his occupations. His trade commonly furnishes
his mind, and therefore his talk, with the analo-
gies that furnish him with the most conviction ;
and the more natural wisdom that will give him,
through increased skill or invention, or extension
of its processes, the more will the spiritual wis-
dom also be augmented that he draws therefrom.

Can it be then that there, should not be a
retribution to our actions, if thus our nature is
single, and feels throughout the condition of
every part ?

1830]

FEAR OF DEATH

315

, November

Is it possible for religious principle to over-
come the fear of death? It is comm,only over-
come, as Bacon observes, by every passion jnd
htimour in, turn, love, honour, revenge, fun, &c.
The instances are familiar of men habitually en-
countering the greatest risks, — sailor and sol-
dier marching up to a battery for sixpence a day.
And multitudes of the lower classes of mankind
di^ continually with almost no exhibition of
fear. In all these instances I apprehend it is not
a conquest of the fear, but a setting it aside. It
is want pf thought. It is a dogged attention to
the fects next them, and not a consideration of
the ev^nt of death.

On the contrary, spiritual men exhibit not
unfrequently strong apprehension, great gloom,
as Dr. Johnson, at the thought of dissolution.
The. more delicate the structure of the mind,
the stronger this emotion, I suppose ; and this
for two reasons, first, because such persons have
more to lose^ in* losing life, and secondly, be-
cause they are not yet spiritual enough to over-
come fear.

I suppo^ that he who . . . lives in the daily
exercise of the purest and most expanded affec-
tions, especially has attained religious principles

3i6 journal [Age

and loves to medit&te on God and heaven, — I
suppose that life is worth to him infinitely more
than it is to a sensual wretch ; life to him is a
world of sweet and holy thought, and the idea
of Idsing it is tremendous. 1 think therefore that
Christianity has done much to increase the fear
of death in the world by the general advance it
has brought about in the cultivation of the moral
powers, whilst it has yet failed to effect any large
portion of society to that degree as to overcome
this terror.

Secondly, I firmly believe that a fuller effect
of Christian principles upon our hearts will be
the disappearance of the fear of death. Men
doubt their immortality because they doiibt the
real independent being of their moral nature.
They fancy the thoughts of God, of goodness,
of love, of ethics generally, may be visions of
the mind, creations of the mind, and it and. they
may perish together.

I suppose that the reality, the independence
of this part of our nature, can only appear to us
by its use, that, in proportion as it is brought
into exercise, its eternity will be felt. I have
always noticed that when I had bgsn occupied
with diligence in any ethical speculation, with the
law of compensations, for example, with the

1830] DYING CHRISTIANS 317

great conclusions that comfi from the analysis
of the affections or any kindred question, — if
from the midst of such thoughts I glance at the
question of immortality, I have at that time a
clearer conyiction of it.

I have heard moreover a great many anecdotes
of people in the last and the former generation,
quiet simple p^eople of Malden and Concord who
had no books but Bible and psalter, and a less
rational therefore, but far more fervid piety than
is common now, who died without fear and with
exaltation even, in the love of Christ. I suppose
though tljey had neglected th^ir minds, they had
cultivated their moral power till it stood out to
their minds a living soul, unaffected by any
change of the body. This is true too of the
apostles, who never speak of death as dread-
ful, to whom to die was gain. . . .

No man addicted to chemistry ever discovered
a salt, or an acid, which he thought divine, never
discovered a lay which bethought God. No man
devoted to literary criticism ever imagined that
any of the thoughts that formed his study was
God. But the man who cultivated the moral
powers, ascended to a thought, and said This is
God. The faith is the evidence.

3i8 journal [Age 27

A great deal may* be learned from studying the
history of Enthusiasts. They are they who have
attained ir different ways to this cultivation of
their moral powers, and so to the perception of
God. The reason why they are erithusiastsi is
that they have cultivated these powers alone; if
they had, with them, trained all their intellectual
powers, they would have been wise, devout men.
Newtons, Fenelons, Channings. The Enthusi-
ast, enraptured with the splendour of his dis-
covery, imagines that whosoever would make the
same must think as he has thought. In his wan-
derings he has come out upon the shores of the
Ocean and, astonished, he believes you ^ must
walk through the same woods, climb the same
mountains and be led by the same guide. Mean-
time the wise Christian sees and rejoices in the
evidence brought by so many and independent
witnesses that the Ocean has been discovered.
The Swedenborgian thinks himself wholly dif-
ferent and infinitely more favoured than the
Quaker or the Methodist. Yet is nothing more
like than the mode in which they severally de-
scribe this common experience. Their likeness is
greater than their difference.

BE YOURSELF

1830]

319

November 5, 1830.

When a man has got to a certain point in his
career of truth he becotjies conscious forevermore
that he must take himself for better, for vjpfse,
a? his portion ; that what he can get out of his
plot of ground by the sweat of his brow is his
meat, and though .the wide universe is full of
good, not a particle can he add to himself but
through his toil bestowed qn this spot. It looks
to «him indeed a little spot, a poor barren pos-
session, filled with thorns, and a lurking place
for adders and apes and wolves. But cultivation
will w*ork wonders. It will eijlarge to his eye as
it is explored. That little nook will swell to a
world of light and power and love.

November 10, 1830.

I thought to-day, in reading Wayland’s excel-
lent sermon on Sundav Schools, that no better
illustration could be to my doctrine of Perse-
verance preached some time ago than this, that
whenever a rpan* first perceives the supposed
necessity of the use of ardent spirits throughout
the community to vanish in his own mind —
when first h# sees in his thought the custom of
drinking separate itself fit)m the idea of society,
and feels for the first time satisfied that it is a

320 JOURNAL [Age *7

thing wholly accidehtal and not necessary, then
the empire of Intemperance receives a fatal blow.
As an illustration of persistency it should be the
condition of the thought, that it comes in the
prosecution of the project of reform; then, wh-in
he has got to that point, he is safe and victori-
ous. And is not this the history of all advance-
ment ? We look at good and ill which grows
together as indissolubly connected :• if an im-
provement takes place in our own mind, we get
a glimpse of an almost imperceptible line that
separates the nature of the thing from the evil
admixture. By a more diligent inspection that
division will farther appear, till it peels off like
dead bark. This is the sense of Coleridge’s
urged distinction between the similar and the
same.

This is the merit of every reformer. One
man talks of the abolition of slavery with per-
fect coolness, whilst all around him sneer or
roar at his ludicrous benevolence. They with
their sinful eyes cannot see. society without
slaves. He sees distinctly the difference, and
knows that the crime is unnecessary. And this
is the progress of every soul. WJjat it joined
before, it now severs, i.nd sin and error are per-
petually falling away from the eternal soul.

1830] WISE SEVERING 321

All our knowjedge comd's in this way. It is
when a man perceives the essential distinctness
of his mind and his body that he is a metaphy-
sician. It is when the sword of the spirit dpth
divide his flesh and his spirit, that he perceives
the immortality of his soul. There is a time
when a man distinguishes the idea of felicity
from the ide§ of wealth ; it is the beginning of
wisdom. There is a time when a man separates
Ggd from his works by a process of his own
mind, and sees clearly that matter is one thing
and the order and forms of matter another.

Tf> the matter of patriotism, remember the
saying of Anaxagoras when blamed for neglect-
ing his cou n try, Wrong me not; my greatest
care is^my country,” pointing to heaven.

The law is a sort of god or divine man to
men, being the sense of equity or conscience ap-
plied, as close as men can, to the action of men.
Yet is it plaii^y •impossible, without prophecy,
to fit it to ail exigencies. It is for its spirit, for
this human heart that is in it, that it has our

reverence.

322 JOURNAL [Age 27

Means and ends.*^ Goodness consists In seek-
ing goodness for its own sake. Heaven is ' not
somethings else than virtue. Truth must be
sought, not for farther ends, but must be the
ultimate end. Prayer too finds the end in the
means. The world is driving ever at ulterior
ends ; the wise man is content to study the pre-
sent event, and to disclose a world of valuable
conclusions in the facts which the vulgar are
shoving aside as the mere obstacles, scaffolding,
steps, over which they must arrive at bread and
wine.

I suppose most young men had rather run
in debt or tell a lie than be known by the inost
elegant young man of their acquaintance to have
made their dinner on onions from economy.
Yet this last had been the act of Epaminondas,
of Scipio, of Regulus, of Socrates, of Alfred, of
Sidney, of Washington, of every great gentle-
man, Persian, Greek or Saxon, that ever lived;
and the first would have been the action of
Commodus, of Chiffinch, of Rochester, of Bona-
parte, of Byron, of Brummel. Virtue is the only
gentility. As soon as a young man is found to
be incapable of virtue he should be bpund out, as
Montaigne says, prentice to make mince pies in
some good town, though he were son of a duke.

,830] GOD IN THE SOUL 323

Plotinus said as follows: The animal life is
aeriform and must be supplied with air. The
eye is soliform and must be supplied with the
sun. The soul is trufh-like and must be fed
wifh truth.”

November 29.

Smother no dictate of your soul, but indulge
it. There are^ passages in the history of Jesus
which to some minds seem defects in his char-
acter. Probably a more full apprehension of his
history will show you these passages in a more
agreeable light. Meantime count them defects,
and da i^ot stifle your moral ^faculty, and force
it to <;all what it thinks evil, good. For there is
no beirtg in the universe whose integrity is so
precious to you as that of your soul.

November *830.^

One mind may hold Europe in counterpoise.
Locke and Poland.

December 10, 1830.

God is the substratum of all souls. Is not
that the solution of the riddle of sympathy ? It
is worms and flesh in us that fear or sympathize
with worms ^nd flesh, and God only within that
worships God of the Universe.

3^4 JOURNAL [Age 27

Is it not remarked by us that always we
endeavour to find ourselves in other men ? All
our honest conversation aims at this point, to
find the conviction in him that has appeared in
me. ' Eloquence is the universal speech. Bad
stammering, vulgar talk, is the issue of self in
the individual. As fast as his nature rises, and
truth appears, and good is sought, so fast he
loses Wii/-loquence in eloquence. For ’t is no-
ticed that all eloquence is uniform, one. Every-
thing bad is individual, idiosyncratic. Everything
good is universal nature. Wrong is particular.
Right is universal.

It has often occurred to me that a man was
a reflection of my own self. ^ understand his
smile and his scowl. So far we go along together
and have one nature. The moment I do not
understand him, the moment he departs from
me, I am pained, for I feel that either he is wrong
or I am. As long as that difference subsists, so
long will our uneasiness on that point. It is an
unshaken conviction of both, that both cannot
be right.

An injury aimed at his body is individual, or
at any of his opinionsr of institutions. But an
assault upon his truth strikes me and every man

1830] INTERNAL EVIDENCE 325

as hard as it does him. A fake sentiment has no
couAtry. It. makes no difference whether it was
ultered in France or Germany, in Cambridge
or in Newgate. Everjf soul to whom it com^^s,
fefls the wound, and resists the enemy as*if it
were personal to itself alone. . . .

December 11.

Internal, evidence outweighs all other to the
inner man. If the whole history of the New T es-
tarSent had perished, and its teachings remained,
the spirituality of Paul, the grave, considerate,
unerring advice of James would take the same
rank wifli me that now theyMo. I should say,
as now^I say, this certainly is the greatest height
to which the religious principle of human nature
has ever been carried, and it has the total suf-
frage of my soul to its truth, whether the miracle
was wrought, as is pretended, or not. If it had
not, I should yield to Hume or any one that
this, like all other miracle accounts, was prob-
ably false. As it is true, the miracle falls in with
and confirms it. . . .

December 21, 1830.

When a truth is presented, it always brings its
own authority. Doth it ncjt? If anyone, denying
Jesus, should bring me more truth, I cannot

326 JOURNAL [Age 27

help receiving it aKo. I do not wish to make
disagreeable or impossible suppositions, but say
it for the extreme case. The value of Christian-
ity, must be shown, must it not, by showing the
amount of truth it has brought ? I am raised by
the reception of a great principle to its height.
And he who communicates, and applies, and em-
bodies, a great principle for me, is, my redeemer
from the evil to which the want of it would have
led me. Bacon showed the inanity of science not
founded on observation. So he is the Restorer
of science. He has not saved my life; he has not
saved my estate ; but he has saved me from one
error, and to that degree is he honourable in my
mind. Newton showed the law of gravity, and
has directed all men to what will be true and
will be false touching bodies, and so has saved a
thousand errors.

December 22, 1830.

Forefathers’ Day; 3 days more, Christmas. A
man will make a better celebration of a holy day
by clearing one principle than all:,the spruce and
games and solemnities of Catholic or I'ipiscopal
Europe united.

The pain that a commandmentgiv»es us should
be more welcome thari all the pleasures of sin,
for ’tis a pledge and a measure of the good we

THE GREAT FACTS

1830]

3V

are capable of, of the excellency of the nature.
But'men forget this and take it wrong.

December 23.

• The simplest facts are the most awful. Is it
not the noblest fact with which we are acquainted
that we are capable of being addressed on moral
grounds ? T|jis fact is so close to the first fact
of our beingy that, like the circulation of the
blqod, or the gravity of bodies, it passes long
unnoticed from the circumstance of its omnipre-

sence.

• ^ December 29, 1830.

Hjldriotaphia of Sir Thomas Browne smells
in evtfry word of the sepulchre. “That great
antiquity, America, lay buried for thousands of
years, and a large part of the earth is still in the
urn unto us.” “ A gem of the old rock, adamas
de rupe veleri praestantissimus." “We, being
necessitated to eye the remaining particle of
futurity, are naturally constituted unto thoughts
of the next world, and cannot excusably decline
the consideration of that duration which maketh

pyramids pillars of snow, and all that is past a
moment,” -r-p. 95. “ To be studied by antiqua-
ries who we were, and have new names given us
like many of the mummies, are cold consolations

3218 JOURNAL [Age *7

unto the students of perpetuity^, even by ever-
lasting languages,” — p. 96.

“There is no antidote against the opium oF
time.”

Authors or Books quoted or referred to
IN Journals of 1830

Thales, Anaximander, Pythagoras, Xeno-
phanes, Anaximenes, Heraclitus, Anaxagoras,
Democritus, Empedocles, Zeno, apud De Ge-
rando, Histoire Comparie des Systimes de Philo-
Sophie ;

Tertullian, apud Life of William Per.n by
Clarkson ; Plotinus ;

Shakspeare ; Bacon ; Donne ;

George Herbert ; Samuel Daniel ;

Sir Thomas Browne, Hydriotapbia ; Milton ;
Bunyan ;

Locke ; Newton ; Scougal, Life of God in the
Soul of Man ; Fenelon ;

Swift ; Montesquieu ; Spence, Anecdotes ^ Ob-
servations^ etc. ; , ^

Dr. Johnson ; Hume, Essays ;

Huber, Nouvelles observations sur lesabeilles;
Goethe, Wilhelm Meister (Carlyje’s transla-
tion) ; t

Clarkson, Life of William Penn ;

READING

1830]

329

Alison, On the Nature and^Principles of ’I'aste ;
Pale^ ; Dugald Stewart ;

'De Gerando, Systemes de Philosophies etc. ;
Sermons of Greenwood ‘Buckminster, Way land ;
Eandor, Imaginary Conversations ;

Edinburgh Review^ on Godwin ;

Sampson Reed, Growth of the Mind; Dr.
Jacob Bigelow, Botany; Webster, Reply to
Hayne.

BLOTTING-BOOK IV

[This manuscript is hard to deal with. Begun
in the autumn of 1 830, and continued next year,
it contains some jottings of lat*er date. These, as
far as recognized, are omitted here. The book
also is a “ double-cnder.” There is little original
matter,, except the Hymn, but it seems to the
editors well to give some notes and quotations,
apparently made in 1830 and 1831, when Mr.
Emerson was introduced by the work of De
Gerando to the philosophers of the various
schools of anciept Jdellas, and also, through him
and Anquetil-Duperron, learned something of
the teachings of Confucius and Zoroaster. Thus
he entered op the path that, years later, led to
the springs of Religion and Philosophy in the
remote past of the Orient.

330 JOURNAL [Agb

At the same period he was forming acquaint-
ance through articles by Carlyle and others in
Frazer's Magazine^ the Foreign Review^ and
other sources, with the German writers, and cop-
ied passages from translations of Goethe’s Wil-
helm Meistery Elective Affinities and his Memoirs
by Falk ; also extracts from Lessing, Schiller,
Fichte, and Novalis. Always curious about ad-
vancing science, he read with interest Lee’s Life
of Cuvier and Sir Charles Bell On the Hand.
Lastly, Walter Savage Landor’s Imaginary Con-
versations gave him great pleasure and he copied
long extracts from them.]

October 27, 1830.

I begin the Histoire Compctree des Syst ernes de
Pbilosophie par M. De Gerando. This leads me
in the outset back to Bacon. {De Augmentis
Scientiae.)

Bacon thought that philosophy in the highest
sense of the word {prima philosophid) was defi-
cient, by which he meant the great principles
that are true in all sciences, in morals and in
mechanics. He said (vol. 1, p. 96), “ I see some-
times the profounder sort of wits in handling
some particular argument, will now and then draw
a bucket of water out of this well for their pre-

BACON

1830]

331

sent use ; but the springhead thereof seemeth to
nie not to have been visited.” By this I under-
stand that generalization which gives* the eleva-
tion to all the writings of Burke, of De Stael,
and now of Sampson Reed. His definition of
this philosophy is “That it be a receptacle for all
such profitable observations and axioms as fall
not within the;compass of any of the special parts
of philosophy or sciences,^ but are more com-
moji and of a higher stage ” (vol. i, p. 95).

(Metaphysics, in the Advancement of Learn-
ings is regioved from this philosophy and con-
fined, within narrower limits, namely, first, to
the discovery of the “ form,” that is, t\\t essential
nature of physical things, as the nature of white-
ness, of heat, of weight ; and secondly, the dis-
covery of “ final Causes,” as why we have eye-
brows, why the skins of animals are covered
with hair, fur, etc.)

M. De Gerando has understood Lord Bacon’s
project of a literary history as intended to de-
velop this highest philosophy rather by furnish-
ing the prenjises than drawing the conclusion.

Bacon (lib. in, cap. 4), tn speaking of Natural
History, proposes to have the fundamental

332 JOURNAL [Age

points of the several sects and philosophies
collected, so that men may see the several opin-
ions touching the foundations of nature, not for
any exact truth that can be expected in those
theories, but because it will be useful to run
over so many differing philosophies as so many
different glosses or opinions of nature {qua-
rum una fortasse uno locoy alia alio^ ^st emendatior),
“whereof it may be every one in some one point
hath seen clearer than his fellows.” But he ex-
pressly warns that it should “ be done distinctly
and severally, the philosophies of every one
throughout by themselves, and not by titles
packed and fagotted up together as hath been
done by Plutarch.” “ For it is the harrtfony of
a philosophy in itself which giveth it light and
credence ; whereas if it be singled and broken,
it will seem more foreign and dissonant.”

It is this idea which De Gerando(Eng. vol. vii,
p. 1 13) applies to the other of the Pritna Philoso-
phia, and proposes himself to pursue. Consid-
ering “ Philosophy as the centre<in which all the
rays of light unite which direct the human mind
in its different pursuits,” he says further, “In
like manner, the ideas which compose each phi-
losophical doctrine in particular form a body and
a whole by the connexion which they have in

DE GERANDO

1830]

333

the^ind of him who has ccfhceived them. Ev-
ejy aoctrine has then in itself its fundamental
conditions which determine both thg develop-
ment of its details and the distinctive chara^er
of its face, so to speak, and the influence which
it exerts around it.”

“ If then,” continues the Baron, “ there are
in philosophy a small number of questions
which, lying at the foundation of all the rest,
shguld exercise over them a natural influence,
and which should furnish the last data necessary
to their solution ; if the opinions which philo-
sophers .have formed respecting this small num-
ber of primary questions ought to determine
by a ^cret or manifest consequence the whole
after-course of their opinions by fixing the
directiqn of their ideas, — if these fundamental
questions, I say, could be known {reconnues\
enumerated, strictly defined, we should have
found a simple and sure means of marking in
a general manner the primary conditions, the
essential characteristics of each doctrine, we
might find the terms which compose one of the
most important laws of the intellectual world.”

The first distinction that is made is that of
Material and Work : changes, not creation.

First come the Cosmogonies. Indians, Chinese,

334 JOURNAL [Age

Chaldeans, Egyptians, Phcenicians, Persians,
have a striking sameness in them, but all tnese
are an intellectual offspring ; no utility, mere
cur/osity.

Next come Theogonies^ fruit of thesg, or rather,
their expression. For to all the great powers and
changes they give a genius, or God, and pre-
sently recite the history of world by a genealogy
of gods. Then, system of emanations.

Idealism a primeval theory. The Mahabarat^
one of the sacred books of India, puts in the
mouth of Jschak Palak these express words;
** The senses are nothing but the soul’s instru-
ment of action ; no knowledge can come to the
soul by their channel {v. L’ Oupnek-hat, par
Anquetil-Duperron, vol. i, p. '467).

The rule “ Do as you would be done by ” is
found in the “ Invariable Medium” of the Chi-
nese, but thrown into the 3d paragraph of the
3d chap. So the Invariable Milieu begins with
these promising definitions. “ The order estab-
lished by heaven is called Nature. What is con-
formed to nature is called Z.<zw,the establishment
of law (in the mind ?) is called Instruction.” (This
Invariable Milieu” M. Abel Rpmusat has
translated into French in ’Tome II. des Notices des
Manuscrits^ 1818.) “What is pure thought?

IDEALISM

1830]

335

Tnat which has, for object^ the beginning of
tilings.” La Isecbncy ch. viii, dans le Zend-
avesta, par Anquetil-Duperron, vol. j, 2d part,
p. 141.

Peter Hunt’s* uncle, sitting by his fire in
Chelmsford, asked his nephew how he knew the
tongs and shoj^el which he handled were actually
there.

Xhe Gnostics removed the sufferings of Christ
from him, the Ai!on, to the body. And there is
some confused idealism in the conversation of
a soldier.with Geo. Fox [Sewell’s History of the
fakers, vol. I, p. 85]. “Christ did not suffer
outwartily,” said Fox. [The Soldier asked him]
“whether there were not Jews, Chief Priests
and Pilate outwardly? ”

Idealism seems a preparation for a strictly

1 Bdnjamin Peter Hunt was a boy who attended the country
school in Chelmsford taught by Emerson in 1825, of whom
the latter said, He was a philosopher whose conversation
made all the social ^comfort I had.’’

In i860, Hunt, living in Philadelphia, wrote to his old
schoolmaster, “It is now thirty-five years since you began
your teachings to me, and, with the exception of those of the
great, rough, hoftest, impartial world, I think they have been
the best which I ever received from any man whom I have per-
sonally known.”

336 JOURNAL [Age 27

moral life, and so skepticism seems necessary- for
a universal holiness.

J^irst Class ; the Ionian School.

Thales begins the Catalogue of acknowledged
philosophers. He taught that “ Water was the
beginning of all things." “In the liquid or fluid
state,” saith De Gerando, “all chemical changes
take place, and it is in that same state that sub-
stances unite to, and identify themselves with or-
ganized bodies — ” Thales was the first physi-
cian opposed to metaphysicians; the Newton who
called attention from speculation to experience.

Next great principle of Thales ; The essence
of the soul is motion^ kivt ) tlk 6 v ti , deiwivv/riKov,
avTOKivqrcKov, i. e., thinks De<Gerando, that he
“ taught the essence of the soul consisted in
free activity." Thus we can make mouse mean
mountain everywhere. De Gerando thinks that
he did not make first principle (ap)( 7 f) mean
both element and cause, but only element, for he
was physic, not metaphysic, studying laws of
nature and not theology, and excluding divin-
ity by supplying second causes for all particu-
lar phenomena. He incurred the reproach com-
mon to most physical philosophers, of Atheism.
Yet doth it appear that, over all this matter, he

,830] GREEK PHILOSOPHERS 337

set k universal cause, and Diogenes Laertius and
Plutatch give these three maxims to him ; God
is the oldest i for he was not made. 'Th^ world is
the most perfect^ for it ‘is the work of God. Jfo
action^ no thqught even is hid from God.

Anaximander made this maxim, Nothing can
come of nothing, and De Gerando says that this
was the pivot on whUch long Greek Philosophy

turned The next wondrous eruption of

Anaximander was T’he infinite is the beginning of
all things ; an infinite altogether immutable and
immense. And surely such transcendentalism
shows Jiow close is the first and that last step
of philosophy.

Anaximenes.

Hermotimus of Qlazomene.

Anaxagoras.

Plutarch remarks “that the Contemporaries
of Anaxagoras gave him the surname of vow?
(mind) because he first had disengaged it from
all mixture, presented it in all its simplicity, and
• its purity, and placed it at the summits of all
being.” I think this a very remarkable passage
of the history of philosophy, as it casts light upon
the disengagement also of the idea of God ; for
the greatest problem of the history of opinions
is whether this idea is reasoned out or revealed.

33^ JOURNAL [Ace 27

Anaxagoras taught at Athens, but is reckf»ned
in the Ionian School because, like them, he
cultivated the Physical Sciences. But the great
merit of Anaxagoras is thus told. Whilst the
system of emanations, the systems qf Pantheism,
the opinions of the first lonians themselves, had
associated the elementary matter of all things to
the first cause of all production,. and thus con-
ceive the Divinity as the universal :ouly the soul
of the world, the world itself as an animated whole
identical in some sort with its author, Anaxago-
ras first detached, separated with precision and
neatness these two notions until then confounded.
The Universe is in his eyes an effect whojly dis-
tinct from its Cause.

This Cause has nothing common with the rest
of beings. It hath its peculiar nature, one, eter-
nal, acts on the world as workman on materials.
So the idea of the first Cause, which until then
was essentially defined by the attribute of Power,
was determined by Anaxagoras to receive chiefly
the attribute of intelligence. • •

De Gerando’s authorities are Aristotle, De
Anima, 1, 3. (Metaphys, i, 3.) Plutarch, Peri-
cles, and Cicero, De Natura Deorim.

Until him, a plurality of Gods. He first an-
nounced that the phenomena of the universe are

,830] GREEK PHILOSOPHERS 339

str\tly connected, that thdy form one whole,
t|jatW ordei" vtxgnSy that its Unity supposes One
mind which ordains it. yide Aristotle , Animuy
I, I. Metaph. 1,3. By banishing God frome^h
^ detail, magic, genii, etc., Anaxagoras was able to
make this demonstration of God over all. Super-
stition opposes truth.

Anaxagoras said, one single soul ran through
all being, Ordering matter, |jut intimately present
to man. He said moreover that the senses were
little to be trusted. Anaxagoras was a nobleman,
but forsook his estate for philosophy, was friend
of PhWiiis and Pericles, and said that his country
(pointing upward) was very dear to him.

Diogenes of Apollonia in Crete, another Ionian
philosopher, rather went backward from Anaxa-
goras, ponfounding cause with matter. This
materialism of theirs seemed to be incapagty
of conceiving cause or principle, except as
inherent in real substance; it was a substance
of great subtilty expanded.

Archelaus of •Miletus also retrograded. In
morals, he taught Hobbism: “That men are
born of the earth, have built cities, formed arts,
made laws ^ the difference between just and
unjust is not founded in*nature, but in positive
laws.”

340 JOURNAL [Age 27

Second Class ; thi Italian School.

Pythagoras taught that Numbers were the prin-
ciples of thifigs ; the monad one, eternal, simple,
perfect; the dyad imperfe'ct, matter, chaos.

“Beings are bound together by a chain of re-
lations parallel or like to those which unite num-
bers.' All these relations converge to one centre.
World forms one whole. Symmetry presides
over the systems of their dependence and their
connexion.”

The Pythagoreans first gave the name /cdtr/xo?
to the world — Beauty. Their notions of God
were more material than the lonians — soul of
the world again — placed him at the centre.
Mystics and spiritualizers were they; hierarchies
of genii; much importance to dreams and predic-
tions, and Pythagoras himself pretended to be
an augur. But they bought this tribute paid to
vulgar superstitions by fine notions of Provi-
dence. Philolaus says, “We are slaves, property
of the Gods ; they govern us, watch us, supply
our wants.” They first gave Virtue this defini-
tion, Virtue is a harmony.

Moderation, thought Pythagoras, the essential
character of Virtue; the Pmipire ov^r self to be

I “ A subtle chain cf countless rings

The next unto the farthest brings,” etc.

See Poems, “ Mayday.”

,830] GREEK PHILOSOPHERS 341

thXmeans of obtaining it ; Inward peace as the
fruitt He gave chiefly practical precepts, diete-
tic, etc., but lamblichus attributed this to him,
“ 'The love of truth ani the zeal of good ar^he
most precious present which God has been able to
grant to man.”

Pythagoreap opinions.

“ The soul is an emanatjpn of the Divinity, a
par^ of the soul of the world, a ray from the source
of light. It comes from without into the human
body, as into a momentary abode, it,goes out of
it anew it wanders in etherea^ regions, it returns
to visit it ; it passes into other habitations, for the
soul isimmortal.” ( “ Man has some affinity not
only with gods, buPt with animals ; one mind runs
througl) the universe.”) "The soul breathes the
representations of the images of things as a sort
of air.” " Reason contemplates all nature, it has
a certain affinity with it. As light is perceived
by the eye, sound by the ear, because of affinity
between object and organ ; so the universality of
nature by reason, because of a consanguinity be-
twixt them.”

Ar chyt as ofTzrcntum has left this great maxim
that " virtue ought to be Sought for itself,” also
that " God is the source and means and end of

342 JOURNAL [Age

all that is conformecf to justice and reason.” And
a profound view of the double operation ok t^e
understanding. “ What can decompound all par-
ticulars contained in a general principle, can ar-
rive at truth and wisdom ; can, in these notions,
in a sort of mirror, behold God and the series of
dependent beings.”

Eudoxus said “ Pleasure is the supreme good,”
but was a good man^

’Third School ; Eleatic,

The Elea.*:ics asked W hy things are ? and sought
the answer in the ?!oul only, and wished fo find
the essence of things. Other philosophers de-
manded, “ What is the generation of things ? ”

Xenophanes demanded, “ Is* there really any
generation ? ” Ex nihilo nil fit, said Tha'es, and
Xenophanes said therefore, “ One thing can never
come from another thing.” Like must produce
like. Then all is eternal. “Thought,” said
Xenophanes, “ is the only real substance.” He
gave to the universe only a phenomenal value.

“ God is one ; there cannot be but one God.
He is always like himself. He cannot be con-
ceived under the human form; He is perfect.
We can’t apply to hibi either motion or limit.
But he is not immoveable nor infinite,” i. e..

1830] GREEK PHILOSOPHERS 343

and limit they belong to matter have
i^elation'to God’s attributes.

Said Zenny,then, not wisely distributed things
into four elements, etc., and entitled hims^ to
the name of a Neptunian Geologist. “ Xeno-.
phanes [said], “ None perceives by the senses
things as they are. We must not then begin
from these opinions, got we know not how, but
from whafis stable, from v^hat reason discovers.”
In»the last part of his life he said, “ he could not
be so happy as to know anything certainly.
Whichever side he looked all ran to Unity —
there 'wiis but one substance.^”

A ad Sextus Empiricus has preserved these
words* from his poem on nature which are as
skeptical as one tould desire. “No man knows
anythipg certain touching the Gods, nor upon
what I say upon the universal whole. None
can. For if one should chance upon the truth
he could not know that be bad obtained it ; but
opinion spreads her veil over all things.” But
it was of the external world, and never of meta-
physical truths, that he was skeptical, saith De
Gerando. It was Idealism which he maintained.

Parmenides, poem on liature.

“ Thought and the object of thought are but

344 JOURNAL [Age 27

one.” These philosophers had. confounded the
abstract notion of being with its objective reality
and thought they could conclude from one to
thft- other. This great mistake has misled a num-
ber of metaphysicians down to Descartes him-
self, says De Gerando. He was the Idealist of
antiquity.

There began from this Eleatic School the
first philosophical dispute, this concerning the
senses and the existence of matter. Zeno was
charged with the defence of the Eleatics against
the dogmatists, who relied of course on common
sense and conscience.

Heraclitus said this good thing: that “a great
variety of knowledge did not make wisdom, but
it consisted in discovering the law which governs
alL.things.”

“ All nature is governed by constant laws.
The phenomena themselves, which appear dis-
cordant, concur in the harmony of the whole. It
is an accord which results from discords. Mean-
time all change. Attraction, Repulsion.” “ The
same cannot be conceived except by the same.”
** Conception cannot be except by* a similitude
between the object and the subject ” ; therefore re-
ject the testimony of the senses, and hear reason.

1830] GREEK PHILOSOPHERS 345

Still, he said that the sen^s were open canals
through which we inhale the divine reason.

* Hence also from this admission to the divine
he founded the authority of Common sense. The
judgments in which all men agree are a detain
testimony of truth. That common light which
enlightens all at once is only the divine reason
spread through all thinking beings by an imme-
diate effusion.” “ The understanding represents
the march of the universe, such, as it has been
preserved by memory ; we arrive then, at truth,
when we borrow from memory the faithful tab-
let qf which the deposit is trusted to it. Wis-
dom is* then accessible to alPmen.” Virtue con-
sists in governing the passions ; wisdom in fidel-
ity to what is trpe. The end of man is his own
satisfaction. The body is to be used as an in-
strument only. Human laws receive their force
from this divine law which rules all at its to*uch,
which triumphs over all.

Hippocrates, the physician, [was] his disci-
ple, an exact ejicperimental philosopher. Hippo-
crates is called the result, the pride of the Ele-
atic School, Pythagoras of the Italian, Thales
of the Ionian.

Always utility gives fhe medal, even though
philosophers are the school-committee.

346

JOURNAL

[Age 27

)]hy-mn]*

There is in all the sons of men
A love that in the spirit dwells,

' That panteth after things unseen.

And tidings of the Future tells.

And God hath built his altar here
To keep this fire of faith alive-
And set his priests in holy fear
To speak the truth — for truth to strive. ,

And hither come the pensive train, .

Of rich and poor, of young and old.

Of ardent youths untouched by pain,

Of thoughtful maids and manhood boH.

«

They seek a friend to speak the word
Already trembling on their tongue,

I This hymn was probably the first trial for that beginning

“We love the venerable bouse
Our fathers built to God/*

which was sung at the ordination of the R^cv. Chandler Rob-
bins, Mr, Emerson’s successor in the Second Church. Both
hymns are printed in the Centenary Edition of the Poems, In
this hymn, in the ;th stanza the original wording humble
Sorrow’s door” is given, as better than that found in a later
verse-book, — ‘'meek Contrition’s door,” the form in the
volume referred to. E. W. E.

1830 ] HYMN — EXTRACTS

347

To touch with prophets hand the chord
Which God in human hearts hath strung.

To speak the plain reproof of sin
That sounded in the soul before.

And bid them let the angels in
That knock at humble Sorrow's door.

Sole so*urce of light and hope assured,

O touch thy servant's lips with power,

So shall he speak to us the word
Thyself dost give forevermore.

“Masi is a microcosm.”

Aristotle.

“ Knowing the Heart of man is set to be
The centre of this world, about the which
These revolutions of disturbances
Still roll ; where all the aspects of misery
Predominate ; whose strong effects are such
As he must bear, being helpless to redress :

And that unlc.ss above himself he can
Erect himself, how poor a thing is man ! ”

Samuel Daniel.

“ The recluse hermit oft-ti«nes more doth know

Of the world’s inmost wheels than worldlings can ;

348 JOURNAL [Agb 27

As man is of thenvorld, the Heart of man
Is an Epitome of God’s great book •

Of creatures, and men need no further look.”

Donne.

He is in little all the sphere.

Oh mighty love ! man is one world, and hath
Another to attend him.

Herbert.

0

“ All things are yours.” St. Paul.

“ There is a secret attraction towards all
points, from within us, diverging from an in-
finitely deep centre.” Novalis.

“ What good were it for me to manufacture
perfect iron, while my own breast is full of
dross What would it stead me to put proper-
ties of land in order, while I am at variance
with myself? ” Goethe, Letter to Werner.

“ If I wished to find some real inspiration,
some profound sentiment, some just and strik-
ing reflexions for my poetical compositions, I
saw that I must draw shem from my own bo-
som.” Goethe’s Memoirs.

EXTRACTS

1830]

349

“ I, for my ghare, canrfot understand how
meft have 'made themselves believe that God
speaks to us through books and histories. The
man to whom the universe does not reveal

directly what relation it has to him, — whose
heart does not tell him what he owes himself
and others, — that man will scarcely learn it
out of books, which generally do little more
than givtf our errors naqjes.”

Wilhelm Meister.

“ Ev«ry one of my writings h^s been fur-
nish6d,to me by a thousand^different persons, a
thousand different things, — the learned and the
ignorant, the wise and the foolish, infancy and
age have come fti turn, generally without hav-
ing tlve least suspicion of it, to brng me the
offering of their thoughts, their faculties, Uieir
experience ; often they have sowed the harvest
I have reaped ; my work is that of an aggre-
gation of beings taken from the whole of na-
ture ; it bears'the name of Goethe.”

“ The smallest production of nature has the
circle of itscompleteness within itself, and I have
only need of eyes to stfe with, in order to dis-
cover the relative proportions. I am perfectly

350 JOURNAL [Age 27

sure that within this circle, however narrow, an
entirely genuine existence is enclosed. A v/ork
of art, on the other hand, has its completeness
ou(^of itself; the Best lifcs in the Idea of the
artist which he seldom or never reaches ; all the
rest lies in certain conventional rules which are
indeed derived from the nature of art and of
mechanical processes, but still ar^ not so easy
to decipher as the laws of living nature. In
works of art, there is much that is traditional ;
the works of nature are ever a freshly uttered
word of God ” Ggethe.

“The great man is he who hath nothi,ng to
fear and nothing to hope from another, ft is he
who, while he demonstrates the iniquity of the
laws and is able to correct them, obeys them
peaceably. It is he who looks on the ambitious
both as weak and fraudulent. It is he who hath
no disposition or occasion for any kind of de-
ceit, no reason for being or for appearing different
from what he is. It is he who can call together
the most select company when it pleases him.”

“ . . . My thoughts are my company. ...”

Xandor.

1830] EXTRACTS 351

“ Character is a perfectly*educated will.”

Novalis.

“ The gift of bearihg to be contradicted,#is,
generally speaking, possessed only by the
dead. . . .” Lessing.

[A very Iqng extract from Goethe’s Wilhelm
MeisteVy the W under jabre^ on the three true
religions is given.

Then follows (from Lee’s Life of Cuvier')
this staterrtent of his fourfold division of the
animd Jcingdom,]

•

“ There exist in nature four principal forms
or general plans according to which all animals
seem tp have been modelled, and the ulterior
divisions of which, whatever name the natur^ist
may apply to them, are comparatively but slight
modifications founded on the development or
addition of certain parts which do not change
the essence of the plan.”

1. Man, and animals like him ;

2 . M0II14SCOUS animals ;

3. Insects and worms*;

4. Radiated animals.

35^ JOURNAL [Age 27

/

“Cuvier rejects fhe idea of, a scale of beings
as not founded in nature, but urges the ‘ n«jces-
sity of con,sidering each being, each group of be-
ings, by itself, and not to make abstraction of any
of its affinities or any of the links which attach
it either to the beings nearest to it or the most
distant from it.’ The True method is to view
each being in the midst of all others : it shows
all the radiations by which it is more or less
closely linked with that immense net-wjork
which constitutes organized nature.”

Lee’s Life of €uvier.

JOURNAL XXII.

FROM ^

1831

'January 10, 1831.

. I AM not to help my neighbour because he
is importunate, nor because wants ; (that does
not exproft^his claim on me) but because he is
God’s ^creature, as I am: and I have'received
all, an^ only hold all I have as occasion of exer-
cising affections. His claim on me is through
God, but this claicn is nearest of any, for the
Bible teaches us that God is in us, and in all,
and there is therefore something in him whiph
is another and the same as myself. I find my-
self in my neighbour, and the object of a charity
is not to relieve want as an end, but by means
of relieving tha^want, to justify myself to him-
self, or to fill both of us with God’s approba-
tion. He only is a perfect man through whom
God’s spirit, blows unobstructed, who seeks
with all his powers God’scnds, seeks usefulness
with every muscle, seeks truth in every thought.

354 JOURNAL. [Age 27

Herein may be 'Been all the evil of the great
controversy about faith and works. Works,4one
as unto the Lord, and not unto men, contain
faith ; and he would be beside himself who
should lift a finger against such.

Great men are great unto men, and not unto
the Lord, and that is the reason why they are
so much suspected. The greatest. man is he
that is not man at all, but merges his human
will in the divine and is merely an image of
God.

There is a greatness, however, that hr:s been
sometimes seen among the gladiators on our
political arena, here and in England. I mean
that elevation of reason that sees clearly great
principles, and trusts magnanimously to them
in the face of present odium, because it has
some insight into their wholesome nature, and
is sure they will work good in the end, and so
justify themselves to the times and to posterity.
This we call noble, and do not grudge our
applause. It takes advantage of that moral ad-
vancement which the world has made, and is
a tribute to that. This has been done by the
Pitts and Burkes and Websters, and is second
only to the praise of Godliness. They do not

1831] ETHICS AND DOCTRINES 355

act as unto men as they are% but to men as they
ought to ^^,»and as some are. If there were no
good men, they would not thus act^ and they
will not now act thus, steadily, invariably. Jf
they acted, to the Lord, they would thus act al-
ways, and they would find this course of action
full of sweetness, and not full of chagrin, as
Burke confesses it*is.

January 24, 1831.

I believe it is true that the devout theist

••

and the devout Christian will agree fully as to
their duiyr The preceptive part of Christianity
enjoii*s no rules of action which are^ot bind-
ing op the theist. It enjoins*love of relations,
friends, country, mankind, and the strictest
virtues, according to the ancient idea of virtue ;
but with this first and last injunction, that
they should be done as unto God.

If this is so, then to be an enemy to Chris-
tianity is to be an enemy to one’s own self.

Let nobody suppose that what are by some
sects called the* peculiar, essential doctrines of
Christianity — Regeneration, Justification by
Faith — make an exception to this remark, or
are not enjojned by the conscience. These doc-
trines, like everything in dispute, have been
strained a great way, yea, out of all shape, but

35^ JOURNAL [Age 27

they are originally' solemn verities, and in that

shape, if presented by an ancient philosopher,

would have to a sound mind absolute authority.

«

Gillen Tucker Emerson died, S^’h February,
Tuesday morning, 9 o’clock. . . .

Chardon St., February 13, 1831.

Five days are wasted since Ellen went to
heaven to see, to know, to worship, to love, to
intercede. . . . Reunite us, O thou Father of
our spirits.

Therd is that which passes away and never
returns. This miserable apathy, I know, may
wear off. I almost fear when it will. Olu duties
will present themselves with no more repulsive
face. I shall go again among my friends with a
tranquil countenance. Again I shall be amused,
I shall stoop again to little hopes and little fears
and forget the graveyard. But will the dead be
restored to me? Will the eye that was closed on
Tuesday ever beam again in the fulness of love
on me? Shall I ever again be able to connect
the face of outward nature, the mists of the morn,
the star of eve, the flowers, and all poetry, with
the heart and life of a.i enchanting friend ? No.
There is one birth, and one baptism, and one

1831] ELLEN’S DEATH 357

first love, and the afFectioiA cannot keep their
youth any more than men.

Her end was blessed and a fit tergiination to
such a career. She prated that God would spetSKl-
ily release her from her body, and that she might
not make this prayer to be rid of her pains, “ but
because thy favour is better than life.” “Take
me, O God, lo thyself,” was frequently on her
lips. N ever anyone spakejwith greater simplicity
or^heerfulness of dying. She said, “ I pray for
sincerity, and that I may not talk, but may real-
ize whaS^i'say.” She did not think she had a
wish get well. . . .

Heft! quantominus est cum reliquis versari^
quam tui meminisie!

February 23, 1831.

The questions that come to me this evening
are few and simple.

It is W'orth recording that Plotinus said, “ Of
the Unity of God, nothing can be predicated,
neither being, nor essence, nor life, for it is above
all these.” Grand it is to recognize the truth of
this and of every one of that first class of truths
which are necessary. Thus, “ Design proves a
designer,” “ Like must* know like,” or “ the
same can only be known by the same,” out of

35^ JOURNAL [Age z7

(

which come the ptopositions in ethics, vis
atnariy ama” and God without can only be
known by God within,” and “ the scriptures can
be explained only by that spirit which dictated
them,” and a thousand sayings more, .which have
a quasi truth instantly to the ear, the real truth
of which is this elementary fact in all, “ like must
know like.” It would be well for every mind
to collect with care every truth of this kind he
may meet, and make a catalogue of “ necessary
truths.” They are scanned and approved by the
Reason far above the understanding. ^They are
the last faLts by which we approximate metaphys-
ically to God.

March 13.

Paul says that his preaching was made effec-
tual to the Gentiles by the same spirit as Peter’s
preaching to the Circumcision. He saith rightly.
There is one light through a thousand stars.
There is one spirit through myriad mouths. It
will not do to divide or bound what is in itself
infinite. Every word of truth that is spoken by
man’s lips is from God. Every thought that is
true is from God. Every right act is from God.
All these are as much done by his .Spirit as the
miracle of the Pentecost, they are of the same
sort as that influence. The apostle who prophe-

1831] GOD TH^: HOLY GHOST 359

sied or who wrought a miracfe, felt that his word
or hi (3 act was as true to the occasion as he did
wfien he lifted bread to his mouth tha/: he might
eat. The prophet undeVstood his prediction^ the
apostle willad the cure of the cripple. If you ask
how he wrought the miracle, I ask how you lift
your arm. By God. I suppose that miraculous
power is only snore power. I suppose it is strictly
of the same kind, for I suppose there is but one
kitvj. There is but one source of power, that is
God.

Thff jeason why I insist on this uTiiformity
and universality of spiritual influence is because
any other view that can be taken of the Holy
Ghost is idolatrofls. If it be received into the
mind a^ a person and separated from God and
God’s common operation, that moment the idea
of God receives a wound in you. All that is
added to the new power is taken from Him. A
man tells me that the Spirit has been poured
out in a great Reformation. Does he mean any-
thing more or anything different from saying that
God, in the infinite variety of his accustomed
ways, has made some men better? If he does
mean differently, he meansfwrong. Does he speak
so fervently of the spirit as to imply more ? 1 say

3^0 JOURNAL [Age *7

f

he is doing injury (to his own mind, and break-
ing up the thought of God into fragments*; lit-
erally he is changing the glory of the incorrupt-
ible God into idols, made like unto good yet
corruptible men. But, it will be said,. The Com-
forter, the Advocate whom the Saviour speaks
of, — did he mean nothing? Truly he meant
what he said. The Comforter whopi the Father
will send you, that is the Spirit of Truth.

... I know well . . . many will not fail to
say; — To what purpose is this attefijpt to ex-
plain zvfny so safe and holy a doctrine as^that of
the Holy Spirit? \Vhy unsettle or disturb % faith
which presents to many minds a helpful medium
by which they approach the idea of God ?

And this question h ‘'I: iS' because I

views of this principle ar^- per-
nicious, because it does put a medium, because
it removes the idea of God from the mind. It
leaves some events, some things, some thoughts,
out of the power of Him who causes every event,
every flower, every thought. The tremendous
idea, as I may well call it, of God, is screened from

the soul. .

Men are made to feel as if they ate their din-
ner and committed their common sins some-

1831] THE UNIVERSAL SPIRIT 361

where in the purlieus of the ‘creation, behind a
screen, for the Spirit of God works in a church,
or 'in Judea, and not in the vulgar affairs of every
day. The Spirit of God teaches us, on the con-
trary, that not a star rolls in space, that not a
’pulse beats in a single heart, not a bird drops
from the bough, not an atom moves throughout
the wide universe, but is bound in the chains of
his omnipotent thought, — nota lawless particle.

And least of all can we believe — Reason will
not let us — that the presiding Creator com-
mands all-watter and never descends into the se-

#

cret chcmbers of the soul. There he is most pre-
sent. Xfie soul rules over matter. Matter may
pass away like a mote in the sunbeam, may be
absorbed into the immensity of God, as a mist is
absorbed into the heat of the Sun; but the soul

t

is the kingdom of God : the abode of love, of
truth, of virtue. The bringing ail minds into
union with him is the work which God worketh
from age to age.

Concord, March 4.

Our goodness is so low that it scarce seems to
approximate to truth, and our knowledge so
scanty that ijt does not approximate to virtue.
But in God they are one^ He is perfectly wise
because he is perfectly good ; and perfectly good

362 JOURNAL [Age 27

t

because he is perfefctly wise. . . . We say of a
bad man that he will not believe because he can-
not understand the great action of a moral hero.
Did we ever see an ex'hibition of intellectual
power by a good man that was not aided, en-
forced, — and that in the intellectual truth too,
— by his goodness ? Milton, Burke, and Web-
ster get most of their wisdom from the heart. . . .

The Religion that is afraid of science disjjon-
ours God and commits suicide. It acknowledges
that it is not equal to the whole of fiTPth, that it
legislatesj tyrannizes over a village of "God’s
empire, but is not the immutable universal law.
Every influx of atheism, of scepticism, ‘is thus
made useful, as a mercury pill, assaulting and
removing a diseased religion and making way for
trtith, and itself is presently purged into the
draught. . . . Keep the soul always turned to
God. Nothing so vast but feel that he contains
it. If your idea of him is dim or perplexed, pray
and think and act more. It is the education of
thesoul. It is the sure way of individual increase.
Sincerity is always holy and always strong. Come
good or ill, the pure in heart are. in the right
way. And presently and often, you shall be re-
warded with clearer perception, the sense of more

1831] GENIUS IS RECEPTION 363

intimate communion. Dear /riendship or soli-
tary piety is often conscious that God’s appro-
bation rests upon it. . . .

Voltaire forsook good, aiming at truth, ai\d
grew up hal/, or less than half, a man, — a*col-
*ourless plant grown in the dark. And many a
religionist hurts the cause of religion by the
opposite error.

•

^t is all reception. Mo^ genius does not in-
crease the individuality, but the community of each
mind. In-i*l 7 e wisdom or fancy (which is oft wis-
dom) naf Bacon and Shakspeare we do not ad-
mire ap arbitrary, alien creatiorl, but we have sur-
prize *t finding ourselves, at recognizing our
own truth in that wild unacquainted field. Who
knows that he has got all the truth he might
have ? Who dares to think he has got all the
good he might have? We dip our finger-tips in
the sea that would make us invulnerable if we
would plunge and swim. Out upon the cold,
hard-eyed zealot w(hose whole religion and whole
sect and all his missions and all his prodigality
of means go to stifle the flame of holy love which
young and Ijeroic minds are nourishing, go to
traduce the spirit of man.

364 JOURNAL [Ace 27

All wisdom, all genius, is reception. The more
perfect the character and the more, rich the gifts,
the more would the individual seem sunk, and '..he
more unmixed would the truth he possessed ap-
peal’. He would exist merely to impart and to
hang on the first cause, — a Socrates, a Jesus.

The moment you describe Milton’s verse you
use words implying, not creation, but increased
perception, second-sight knowledge of what /V,
beyond the ken of others. Yet these are pro-
phecy. . . .

Various'psychological facts to be remem^bered :
— Socrates’s abstraction ; Anaxagoras ; Hermo-
timus burned in a trance ; Plotinus ; Marivaux’
description of inequality of mental states ; New-
ton’s saying, that attention to what was true is
all ; Shakspeare and Bacon as attentive to what
is true as Kirby or Swammerdam.

Whole zeal of opposers of one uniform ; spir-
itual influence proceeds [not?] from inattention
to the strictly divine character of ordinary phe-
nomena. All is miracle, and the mind revolts at
representations of two kinds of miracle.

Opus quod Deus operatur a primordio usque ad
finem.

1831] LIVE FOREVER 365

%

Will God work only in Ge«logy and not come
into gecret' chambers of Spirit ? Seek to dwell
with God, O man.* . . . Let all the common
duties derive dignity from the dedication to th*e
Mpst High, . . .

Live forever shall be writ on every thought,
A day will not suffice ; but form habits of grand
life, form yourself, your affections, your friend-

I In these years it was more and more impressed on Em-
erson that Nature spoke by parables — the facts that met the
eye of the dulle^^even at every turn — to man’s spirit, and thus
that Religion was revealed to him each hftur an^ jiot merely
in past ccft‘'uries. He began to read b4;>oks on science with
keen intesest. Here are some notes written on a loose bit of
paper, shfft into^his journal: —

It was a resurrccticvi in miniature,” said Cuvier.

Sir James Hall and Gregory Watt set out to see how the
world wasTnadc, — basalt and sand stone.

As to burning out coal, we will warm the world with grinS-
Btoncs by and, by.

A bubble of water, a grain of gunpowder.

A shell may teach more than a range of mountains.

Heat keeps the easth, from assuming the shape of a small
crystal.

Expansion of water by freezing.

Man comes in and turns the fishes out. Fishes and their
senses fit for thcir*elcmcnt.

Atomic theory. Water the mir/br, the solvent, the engin-
eer, the presser, the scavenger.

366 JOURNAL. [Age 27

ships, your charitibs, your talk, your commer-
cial dealings, on principles so vast it will knfuse
a mighty ^soul into them all. God will be felt.
Cannot a mind thus foriued, or reformed, bet-
ter understand a science or an honest art than
another ? Can it not acquire such self-subsist-
ence as to give, not take, character from its
neighbourhood ? The imputation to which
priests have always been subjected is that their
private and their public discourses differ,, that
whilst they say one thing formally, they sym-
pathize fqlly with other men in pi'lvate, and
reason and apprehend or regret the sanie' trivial
inconveniences as they. . .

Now this is the fault of the priest in part, in
part the fault of man, and i.i part the mistake
of the censurer. Who expects that the worship-
per of God should be wholly grave, overlooks
a great part of nature. A grave man i.s no more
a perfect character than a jester. I'here are many
truths manifested by the ridiculous. And in in-
telligent society, abundance of humour and wit
will appear. No one can take sufficiently gen-
erous views of Providence, none can go out into
the fields and see the rejoicing beauties of morn-
ing and of spring, or enter an evening party,
without feeling that God never meant that his

1831] COUNTRY LIFE 367

children should shun each other or should wear
a sad countenance.

WRITTEN AT CHARDON ST., BOSTON
Spring of 1831

Dear brother, would you know the life,

Please God, that T .would lead ?

On the first Vheels that quit this weary town
Over yon* western bridges J would ride,

And with a cheerful benison forsake
Each street and spire and roof, incontinent.

Then wOuld I seek where GocJ woqjd guide my
• ^teps •

Amijji the mountaih shires, Hants, Franklin, Berks,
Wh^e down the rock ravine a river roars
Even from a broq)c, and where old woods.

Not tamed and cleared, cumber the ground
Withitheir centennial wrecks.

Find me a slope where I can feel the sun,

And mark the rising of the early stars.

There will I bring my books, — my household
gods,

The reliquaries* of my dead saint, and dwell
In the sweet odour of her memory.

Then in the uncouth solitude unlock
My stock of art, plant dials in the grass.

Hang in the air a bright thermometer.

And aim a telescope at the inviolate sun.

368 JOURNAL [Age 27

t

April I, 1831.

The spring is wearing into sum'mer, anU life
is wearing- into death ; our friends are forsaking
us, Qur hopes are declining ; our riches are wast-
ing ; our mortifications are increasing, and is die^
question settled in our minds, what objects we
pursue with undivided aim ? Have we fixed our-
selves by principles ? Have w» planted our
stakes ?

April 3.

Trust tck that prompting within you. No man
ever got*above it. Men have transgresjsdd and
hated and blasphemed it, but no man evensinned
but he felt it towering above him threaten-
ing him with ruin.

♦The troubled water reflects no image. When
it is calm it shows within it the whoje face of
heaven.

Our vices even, prove the being of God, as '
shadows point in {sic) the direction of the
sun.

It is a luxury to be understood.

183 1] FAST-DAY SERMON 369

Boston, April 4.

^The days’ go by, griefs, and simpers, and
sloth and disappointments. The de^d do not
return, and sometimes'we are negligent of their
intage. Not of yours, Ellen. I know too well
who is gone from me. And here come on the
formal duties which are to be formally dis-
charged, and in our sluggish minds no sentiment
rises to quicken them, they seem —

And when the Fast comes, what shall I say?
It is forgot and despised. It is remainder of an
ancient race* and like old furnjture^to be dis-
penseti^with, it is huddled aside by tlfe upstart
genersvtion as if it’were a disgrace to their re-
finement aod^enlarged views of things. Perhaps
there yet remain nn the present race so much
kindne^, so many kindred to the former, as will
not like to see their venerable usages trampled
upon. Something may be said for those old
people, that generous race who delivered two
countries, England and America, from tyranny,
and founded the .institutions by which our fa-
thers and ourselves were reared. It is well to re-
member the departed. P'.ven savages keep their
fathers’ bones. . . . I'he noble love the dead.
The Jews were taught 4 n their prosperity to
remember the day of small things, to remember

37° JOURNAL [Acs 27

the outcast Joseph, and say, “ My father was a
Syrian and went down a bondman: to Egypt.”
They were taught to remember in their pro-
sperity the stranger, and say, “ I was a stranger
when the Lord brought me intorthis land.”
And happy would be the people of this land/
if they never grow unmindful of their stock and
stem (for we remember that which is like our-
selves) ; if the pride of ancestry from men that
loved God and freedom more than worldly good
does not fade out of their minds. We may
grow so besotted as to think that* & disgrace,
which is t)ur chiefest ornament, like the stag in
the fable. A fop thinks the' simple dress and
mann^er. 9 - of his country-father mean. Let us
not be such coxcombs as to uioTh-^^nour the gray
hairs of the Puritans. I think of them as uTien
whom God honoured with great usefulness.
That solid sense, that expansion of the inner
man, that greater reverence for history, for law,
which they had, may compensate for thrift and
mechanical improvements and ftne houses which
they had not.

Seriousness may be forgiven to the redeemers
of suffering Liberty, to the defend/;rs of Relig-
ion, to the pious men who kept their integrity in
an unholy age. Danger is when men will not keep

1831] BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR 371

%

quiet, and grow restless fron> turning the eye out,
instead of inward. When those men had asserted
their rights they were appeased and still. We
think stillness stagnation, and in a man want
of thought. It is want of thought that makes
this everlasting inquietude. Great men ; great
thoughts have th?y bequeathed to the world. 1
will honour jheir Institution, if only because it
was theirs. Whatever relic precious has come
dqwn, I won’t spit upon.* I will respect this Fast
as a connecting link by which the posterity are
bound tc Lhe fathers; as a trumj) through which
the voice of the fathers speaks.

THE BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR.*

April 9.

Pleasure taken in Ravenswood’s grand feudal
character great. And why? because tiie contem-
plation of somebody that we could depend upon,
and should without risk admire and love if we
should converse with him, is pleasing. The soul

I In his speech at the Scott Centennial celebration in Boston,
Mr, Emerson said of this novel, The Bride of Lammermoor
almost goes back to iEschylus for a counterpart as a painting
of Fate, — leaving on every reader the impression of the high-
est and purest tragedy.'* ( Sec Miscellanies , )

The last half of this passive in the Journal is used in
•^History,*' Essays II.

yji JOURNAL [Age 2^

believes in its own fmmortality and whilst this
character floats before it, is already anticipating
intercourse with such in other states of being. Is
it not too, that by the law'of sympathy the soul
sees in every great character only a^ mirror in
which its own pinched features are expanded to
true dimensions, “ the shows of things to the de-
sires of the mind.” And does it notfind a lesson
herein, the suggestion that a mind raised above
circumstances may fight this heroic battle day, by
day ; that Sir William Ashton is only another
name for a vulgar temptation ; that Raytnswood
castle is otrly another name for proud poV’erty
and the “ foreign mission of state,” only a Bun-
yan disguise for honest industry ; that we may all
shoot a wild bull that would toss the good and
beautiful, by fighting down the unjust and sen-
sual ; that Lucy is another word for fidelity, which
is always beautiful and always liable to great suf-
fering in the world, but which is true to itself,
and trusts God for success in the abysses of his
designs.

April II, 1831.

The love of novels is the preference of senti-
ment to the senses. Who are they tl^t love an
ideal world and dwell inU? The young, the pure,
who believe that love is stronger than lust ; who

NOVELS

>?3il

373

delight in the belief that virrtie may prevail over
the power of circumstances. ... If the princi-
pfes of Jesus could take possession of ^11 breasts,
life would not be vile. Society would be pure
btit not puritanical. 'T is because we are such
half-faced friends of God that we have this awk-
wardness of religion, hjoltness without beauty. In
its soured it ds the all-fair. A community of
Christians Would be a fiel^of splendid occasions,
exciting recollections, purposes ; grand charac-
ters and epical situations that would leave the
loftiest fiction, of prose or vefse, t^r beneath
it. . :

What you seek’in these novels is the friend-
ships you wopld form with tempers so true and
majestic on whichT an infinite trust might be re-
posed. .They would act for you across the earth
and could not be bribed or scared or coobd.
Now in eyery mind is the material of all this ro-
mance and that is the way in which every mind
is heir of heaven. Have you not ever felt the
pleasure, the toSsmg, the turmoil of a lofty sen-
timent? When your pillow would not give rest
to your head because of the delight of what you
had done or determined. How was life ennobled,
and death in that hour last . much of his dread.
Is there not living in the world the person for

374 JOURNAL [Ace

whose advantage y5u would eagerly have made
costliest sacrifices ? That sentiment, that Occa-
sion, was the beginning of all good to you, if
only persevered in ; and if you have left that way,
you have wandered; and how have'you fared
therefore is life stale and cheap. It is wonderful
that men do hot learn this lesson from love, so

' f

familiar in its lower stages, but seldom carried
to any heights.

“ All other pleasures are not worth its pains.’’

Now a greater heroism than has^’delighted
you in Wallace, or Richard, or Ravenswo*od, is
offered to you. In the common sun and 'air, in
the paved street, in all the details.>rite of vul-
gar life you may tread with tRe step of a king.
You may not fight down rivals, but you may
live like a wise man among silly people. Among
gluttons and sycophants you may carry the
hand of Franklin and the heart of Paul. And
the good call out great sentiments, as well as
give them out. That which is- like you in other
minds will start from sleep in your presence.

*April 23.

What so fit for ma'n as trust? He did not
make himself ; he has no finger in the opera-

TRUST

375

tions of the universe. . . ! Let him be calm :
let him assiime the port of a resolved mind that
waits an enemy, but does not fear him. This is
the first step. Then let him open his eye and
ffcart to the good he has received, and put his
finger, if he can, on his title-deed. Are you so
happy ? Have you so much ? The height of
your fear shows the price of your stake. Well
now, by iVhat right is j,t yours? It is all re-
ceived. And, if any cause to complain, it is that
it would be inconsistent with the goodness that
has been shown you not to .show you more.
Not ‘with vour merits, observe, but with that
graces Well then, I don’t see but you may
trust It sttii »

Again, man is greater by leaning on the great-
est. Nature is commanded by obeying her. God
lends his strength to the good. Thus it is wis-
est, firsts because you cannot help yourself, any
whimpering would be ridiculous ; and secondly,
't is wisest, because there ’s every reason for af-
fectionate trust', for a voluntary act of approval
of God’s order. What so sublime and so in-
dicative of a perception of the matchless wis-
dom that directs as implicit trust ?

“One man may lead* a horse to water, but
ten canna gar him drink.” It is so in the order

376 JOURNAL [Age 2;

of Providence with* man. Heaven gpards his
freedom so carefully that nothing compels him
to enter iato the spirit of the festival to which
he is invited. He may pout in the corner, if he
will, and suck his thumbs. But the ‘loss is hlb
own. The company is large and can easily spare
him; but he would do more wisely to conform
himself to circumstances intended kindly, and
carry forward the brilliant game.

April 25, .

From our feeble hands we drop^the tools.
Nobody thinks ©f the duty and the nobleness
of institutfng a perjfect life. Nobody acts three
days on a system. A man rises from a good'book
or from a good example and the erecnal chord
in him vibrates to heaven’s melody a moment,
and then the superincumbent flesh steps its
tone. If in some distant world the vision of
these weeks we are now so idly spending shall
come full on the memory, is it not probable
they will be attended with poignant regret?
Shan’t we think what capabilities, — and what
nothings of act ! Perhaps we cannot even form
steady views of duty ; then we are very low in-
deed and this defect should alarm ust But there
is a capacity of virtue ih us, and there is capac-
ity of vice to make your blood creep.

SCHILLER

377

185.)

Plotinus ^udore quodam affici videbatur quod
anima*ejus in ’corpore esset.

“ In their distress

They call a sgirit up, and when he comes
Straight their flesh creeps and quivers, and they dread him
More than the ills for which they called him up.

The uncommon, the s'qblime, must seem and be
Like things of e'^ery day. But in the field.

Aye, there^ the Present Beingynakes itself felt.

The- personal must command, the actual eye
Examine. If to be the chieftain asks
All that is great in nature, let it be ,

Likewise his privilege to move and act
In all thf correspondehcies of greatness.

The ora^tlc within him, that which //Wx,

He must invoke and question — not dead books.

Not ordinances, not mould-rotted papers.”

Schiller’s IValUnstein^ Coleridge’s Translation.

“ In your <Jwn bosom are your destiny’s stars :
Confidence in yourself, prompt resolution.

This is your Venus ! and the sole malignant.

The only one that’harmeth you is Doubt."

Ibid,

“ At the approach

Of extreme peril, when a hollow image
Is found a hollow image* and no more, —

Then falls the power into the mighty hands

378 JOURNAL [Age 27

Of nature, of the spirit giant-born

Who listens only to himself."

Ibid.

Of its own beauty is the mind diseased
And fevers into false creation.”

Admiration is a sure mark of a noble mind.
Uncommon boys follow uncommon men. Vul-
gar minds are too much wrapped up in them-
selves to mark, much less to estimate, anoth-
er’s merits, though they shine as the sun. But
you admire and you despair; you have no fel-
lowship with what you admire, and it seems to
you that real life is a waste' where all your fel-
lows act on low motives, and pqjj-ri out all the
vessels of ridicule on the innocents who would
hope to act on any better, as unpracpcal and
romantic. Love even, and high sentiments are
regarded as boarding-school wares. Well now,
what is the lesson God teaches you hereby as
with an angel’s trumpet? that you should sternly
conform your life to the dictates of lofty senti-
ment, that you should be what you admire.
But you say. Nobody can; nobody will esti-
mate me. Very likely, but that is exactly the
scope and occasion of great sentiments, to
prompt right against the voice, it may be, of

SUNDAY SCHOOL

379

* 83 *]

the whole world. Every popinjay blows with
the wind.' The thunder cloud sails against it.
. *. . Men take counsel in moments^ of peril of
the deceptive face of things and not from them-
selves. Always listen to yourself, never be
tempted to a word of vanity or of pride; persist
in the old vulgar, road of benevolence : make
his good with whom* you deal a real omnipre-
sent motive, whilst and whenever you deal with
hini. Persist, only persist in seeking the truth.
Persist in saying you do not know what you do
not know, and you do not care for what you do
not care. . . .

May 1 8, 1831.

W?nt t&night to the Sunday School meeting,
but was myself a dumb dog that could not bark.
Question was whether the instruction at Sunday
School should be exclusively religious. 1 should
have said that in God’s goodness this instruc-
tion blessed twice, him that gives and him that
takes. Teacher must consider it an institution
whence heisto derive most essential benefit,and,
in order to give and gain the most, he is to aim
at the great end with his whole might. If he filT
himself with an earnest love of God, all the rest
shall be added unto him» The question will an-
swer itself in his practice. It is well known that

380 JOURNAL [Ace

it is the property 'of the human mind, when
strongly aroused by any sentiment; by any* pas-
sion, by the love of any science or art, to give
its whole knowledge and* powers the new force
of an arrangement after that principle. And thtn^
it acts with as much more efficiency than before,
as an organized army acts than a great mob.
Whatever passion, whatever love, arrives at a
certain heat in a mind,^melts away all' resistance,
fuses all its knowledge, turns everything JUce
fire to its own nature. The poet casts his eyes
on no object, ho,w mean soever, not on a tub or
shoe, but* it grows poetical in his eyq. The
whole world is a poem to him. The mathema-
tician does not see the dome of a cjM*?ch, or the
corner of a house or of a table, but it is a dia-
gram to prove a truth in geometry. The ntourner
rea^s his loss in every utensil in his house, in
every garment, in the face of every friend. Well
now, let the Sunday School teacher dwell fer-
vently alone on the great idea whose servants
and worshippers we all are, let him be in heart
and soul a worshipper of God, and he will find
no need to prescribe rules to direct his instruc-
tions into one or another course. He will see
the religious face of everything. He will draw
precisely that tone and accord of thought he

ILLUMINATION

{830

381

wants from things you would call common and
unclean. He will do better than the fable told
Sf the Lydian king whose touch turned every-
thing to gold. He will show everything to be
good and ‘from God. But I see the meanness
’ of this illustration : let me offer a better. He
will be like the hand of Christ which touched
the rolling eyeball, and it saw, which touched
the paralytic and he was made whole ; yea, and
wa^ laid upon dead bones and they started up
again into human life, and praised God. He will
be a freem*an whom the trutji haj made free,
and will put the whole compass of all his read-
ing ajid all his ex] 5 erience under contribution to
convey proofs of God’s being and Providence
into the mind of his pupil. Nobody doubts, I
suppo,se, that this can be done. Every chip and
sea weed contributes its part to the gravity of
the system, and every object in the universe,
every truth bears testimony to God.

May 10.

Blind men in Rome complained that the
streets were dark. To the dull mind all nature
is leaden. To the illuminated mind the whole
world burns and sparkles with light. You read
a poor essayist and you feel humiliated at the

382 JOURNAL [Age 28

poverty of human wit ; a few oft repeated saws
seem to be all it has attained. You read Burton,
or Montaigne, or Sir Thomas Browne — you
read Bacon, and you are in wonder at the
profusion of wise observations which they seem
to have barrelled up from the vast common-'
places of mankind. The more a man knows, he
is the more prepared scholar. The magazine
shows more inexhaustible, and the particulars of
greater price every moment. Every weed, evpry
atom, discloses its relations. Mens agitat molem.
“To virtue every day is bright, and every hour
propitious to diligence and that is the virtue
of increased intelligence that it imparts wofth to
what was counted worthless. The p^:ogress of
manufactures finds a yellow dye in a crumbling
rubbish stone ; plants a thistle for its teazel ;
plucks a whortleberry bush for unwinding silk ;
saves the coke after the coal is burned, and saves
the ashes after the coke is consumed ; and so
works up into its processes the refuse and dung
of the world with the frugality of nature herself.

Mens agitat molem. The whole is instinct
with life.

^,831] THE PASSING — ELLEN 383

WRITTEN AT WILLIAMSTOWN, VERMONT

June I, 1831

Why fjpar to die
And let thy body lie
Under the flowers of June,

Thy body food •

For the ground worm’s brood,

And tliy grave smiled on by the visiting
moon ?

Amid great Nature’s halls,

Oirt in by moiyitain walls »
ifnd washed v<^ith waterfalls.

It woufd f)lease me to die,

Where every wind that swept my tomb
<joes loaded with a free perfume
Dealt out with a God’s charity.

I should like to lie in sweets,

A'hill’s leaves for winding-sheets,

And the searching sun to see
That I am laid with decency.

And the commissioned wind to sing
His mighty psalms from fall to spring,

And annual tunes corrmiemorate
Of Nature’s child the common fate.

384

JOURNAL

[Age 28

r ELLEN

*»

Dust unto dust ! and shall no more be said,

Ellen, for thee, and shall a common fate
Blend thy last hour with the last hours of all ?

Of thee, my wife, my undefiled, my dear?

The muse thy living beauty could inspire
Shall spare one verse to strew thy urn
Or be forever silent. Ellen 'Is ‘dead.

She who outshone all beauty, yet knew not
That she was beautiful,* she who was fair
After another mould than flesh and blood.

Her beauty was of God. The maker* s, hand
Yet rested on its work.

And cast an atmosphere of sanctity

Around her steps that pleased old age and ycuth r

Yea, that not won the eye, but did per«»‘ade ^

The soul by realizing human herpes.

Teaching that faith and love were not a dream.
Teaching that purity had yet a shrine.

And that the innocent and affectionate thoughts
That harbour in the bosom of a child
Might live embodied in a riper form.

And dwell with wisdom never bought by sin.
Blessed, sweet singer, were the ears that heard ;
her the eye that saw bare witness . . .

June 15.

After a fortnight's v^andering to the Green
Mountains and Lake Champlain, yet finding

BE GOD’S CHILD

* 83*1

385

you, dear Ellen, nowhere aijd yet everywhere, I
come again to my own place, and would willingly
transfer some of the pictures that the eyes saw,
in living language to my page ; yea, translate the
fair and magnificent symbols into their own sen-
timents. But this were to antedate knowledge.
It grows into us, say rather, we grow wise, and
not take wisdom ; and only in God’s own order,
and by my concurrent effort, can I get the ab-
stract sense of which mountains, sunshine, thun-
ders, night, birds and flowers are the sublime
alphabet.

'June 20.

I suppose it is not wise, not being natural, to
belong to any religious party In the Bible you
are not directed tp be a Unitarian, or a Calvin-
ist or an Episcopalian. Now if a man is wise, he
will not only not profess himself to be a Uni-
tarian, but he will say to himself, I am not a mem-
ber of that or of any party. I am God’s child, a
disciple of Christ, or, in the eye of God, a fellow
disciple with Christ. Now let a man get into a
stage-coach with this distinct understanding of
himself, divorcing himself in his heart from every
party, an,d let him meet with religious men of
every different sect, and |ie will find scarce any
proposition uttered by them to which he does

386 JOURNAL [Age 28

not assent, and none to the sentiment of which
he does not assent, though he may insist on
varying the language. As fast as any man be-
comes great, that is, thinks, he becomes a new
party. Socrates, Aristotle, Calvin, Luther, Abe-
lard, what are these but names of parties? Which
is to say. As fast as we use our own eyes, we quit
these parties or Unthinking* Corporations, and
join ourselves to God in an unpartaken relation.

A sect or party is an elegant incognito devised
to save a man from the vexation of thinking.

Since to govern my passions with aosolute sway
is the work I have to do, I cannot but think that
the sect for the suppression of Intemperance, or
a sect for the suppression of loose behaviour to
women, would be a more reasonable and useful
society than the Orthodox sect, which is a society
for the suppression of Unitarianism, or the Uni-
tarian, which is a society for the diffusion of use-
ful knowledge.

Religion is the relation of the soul to God,
and therefore the progress of Sectarianism marks
the decline of religion. For, looking at God in-
"'^antly reduces our disposition to dissent from
our brother. A man may die by a fever as well
as by consumption, and religion is as effectually
destroyed by bigotry as by indifference.

18,311 THOMAS A KEMPIS 387

The best part of wisdom ‘can never be com-
municated, as books never can teach the use
of books.” And as Bacon said, “ the best part of

beauty could not be represented in a picture.”

%

To a philosophical infidel the writings of
Thomas a Kempis, of Fenelon, of Scougal,
should be shc.wn. For the fact that such a new
science as this they treat, has been drawn out
of the New Testament, — the creation of such
a theory as the mind of Thomas a Kempis
[evolved] in its very nature claiming authority
over all other principles — is a mighty evidence
for the divine authority of Scripture.

Wherever goes a man, there goes a great
soul. I, never more fully possess myself than in
slovenly or disagreeable circumstances. Whe^n I
stamp tlyough the mud in dirty boots, I hug
myself with the feeling of my immortality.* I
then reflect complacently on whatever delicacy
is in my taste, of-amplitude in my memory. In
a university I draw in my horns. On nothing

I The image was borrowed from Mme. de Stael, quoted by
Mr. Emerson fn the beginning of the chapter “ Literature”
in English Traits : “ i tramp iti the mire with wooden shoes
whenever they would force me into the clouds.”

388. JOURNAL [Ace •%%

does a wise man phame himself so much as on
independence of circumstances ; that in a kitchen,
or dirty street, or sweltering stage-coach, he can
separate himself from inipure contact and em-
bosom himself in the sublime society of his
recollections, of his hopes and of his affections.
Ambassador carries his country with him. So
does the mind.

The days pass over' me
And I am still the same;

The aroma of my life is gone

Like* the flower with which it came.

FROM BLOTTING BOOK III
June, 1831

Si cum natura sapio et sub Numinty
Id vere plusquam satis est.

Giordano Bruno.

** Our first and third thoughts coincide.”

Stewart.

“ We know the arduous strife, the eternal laws
To which the triumph of all good is given,

High sacrifice and labour without pause
Even to the death, else wherefore shocld the eye
Of man converse with immortality? ”

Wordsworth.

i83iJ compensation 389

Chardon St. [Boston]^ June 29, 1831.

IsiHot the law of compensation perfect? It
holds as far as we can see. Differei^t gifts to
different individuals, hut with a mortgage of
responsibilifty on every one. “ The gods sell all
tilings.” Well, old man, hast got no farther?
Why, this was taught thee months and years
ago. It was writ on’the autumn leaves at Rox-
bury in keep-school days ; it sounded in the
blind man’s ear at Cambridge.* And all the joy
and all the sorrow since have added nothing to
thy wooden "book. I can’t help it. .Heraclitus
grown jold complained that all resolv'ed itself
into idi^ntity. Thji? thought was first his phi-
losopliy, and then his melancholy, — the life
he lived and the*death he died. And I have
nothing; charactered in my brain that outlives
this word Compensation. Old Stubler, the Qua-
ker in the.Baltimore steamboat, said to me, that,
if a man sacrificed his impurity, purity should
be the price with which it would be paid ; if a
man gave up his* hatred, he should be rewarded
with love — ’tis the same old melody and it
sounds through the vast of being. Is it a great

I Referring tt> the failure of his eyes (perhaps iritis) with
that of his general health, in his ^amp room in Divinity Hall
in 1821;.

39® JOURNAL [Age ]J!8

exertion to you ta contain your roving eye, is
it very easy to please it, and very hard to for-
bid it? Well, exactly proportionate is the merit
of the self-denial and th'e power it confers. Is
it a great estate that is within your grasp ? Will
a little servility, a few derelictions, not gross
themselves, and such as few. can know, suffice
to give you an easy subsistence fp'r many years,
and do you say it were foolhardy to toss your
head with unseasonable virtue that perhaps you
will not sustain, and lose the prize ? But will
you gain nothing by the loss ?. Consider it well ;
there ’s do cheating in nature, not a light half-
penny; not a risk of a doit which is not insured
to the total amount on the credit cf the king
of nature. By that sacrifice of body to soul,
of the apparent to the real, have you not given
body and fact to a sentiment, which, if it is not
recognized on ’Change, is sterling with God and
his creation? Have you not been filled, spiritual-
ized, exalted by a delicate, rare magnanimity
which constitutes you a nobleman in the king-
dom of heaven? Have you not given firmness
to your brow, an unquestionable majesty to
your eye when you meet other eyes, a serenity
to your solitude, — yea, just so much of as-
sured presence of God to your soul? ’Tis a

ig3i] HIGH SENTIMENTS 391

noble but a true word of Batfon, — “ If once the
mind has chosen noble ends, then not virtues
bvft Divinities encompass it — Si animus semel
generosos fines optavertt^ statim non mode virtutes
civeumstantfsed et Numina.” * And so it is, these
sentiments are the true native angels of the king-
dom, having their Jineage written on their faces.
The adoption, in act of a great sentiment gives
you assurance on the faith of Him that liveth
that, you have made exactly that progress which
you seem to have made ; but my riches add
nothing to me. They make ly) evidence, but
only bewilder my inquiries for trutlf. In the
most l^arren, echojiTg solitude,^ small, disagree-
able circumstances, these thoughts give a ground
of assurance mosf solid. In a hovel, low born
and fec^on husks, you may think thoughts and
act after a manner that you are sure is qualify-
ing you ^very day for the most exalted enjoy-
ments of friendship, though the word may be
gibberish or a laughing-stock in that place.

1 Probably the correct version is that which occurs a few
pages later in this journal: Anirnum qui generosos fines semei
optaverii, non virtutes solum ^ sed Numina lircumstant,

ifhe man who srclcs a noble end

Not angels, but diviritics, attend.

See Poems ^ Centenary Ed,, Appendix,

392 JOURNAL [Age 28

The friends exist, ‘and the sympathy is form-
ing, though perhaps years or ages may inter-
vene before the good effects you seek on God’s
faith shall be fully accomplished, before this
union takes place.

What matters it to the mind, as far as con-
cerns the evidence, how one or another fact
looks, what may be the aspect of,things toward
materialism, what may be the impression got
from Geology, or the conatuSy or equivocal gen-
eration, or any other humbug? Does not every
consciousness cpntain its own evidence ? That
consciousness which “cannot ferment its mass

I «

of clay,” that apprehends diqth, will die. That
which looks death in the face, the master, not
the slave, carries therein its own hope and as-
surance. Now my affections prophesy, to me
ou,t of heaven, where my angel is, and when I
listen to them I do not fear death. I §ee plainly
that the ends to which 1 live are independent
of time and place; and neither the hope nor the
fear of conscience profess themselves satisfied
with the scanty inches of mortal life.

, June 30.

One thought more has occurred to me (if
there is no logic by which these thoughts cohere.

1831] OBEDIENCE CONQUERS 393

the mind itself uttering nocessary truth must
be ^heir ‘binculum)., and that is, that God makes
us the answerers of our own prayers and so ful-
fils the cycle and perfection of things, and, as in
Others, so in the prayer, to be immortal : . . .

9

IMPERAT PARENDO

Obedience,is thefeye which reads the laws of
the univesse. Rejoice when you have not bent
yoyr desires to your convenience, but have
rested in no good below the level of your de-
sires. Use Tock^ to ascend streams, but never
to descend. Go buoyed up as higlf as senti-
mentg of heaven^will, and do* not huckster with
sens^ and custom, but treat with princes only,
— a sovereign with a sovereign.

S'

It is remarkable that we cannot be willing to
say, I do not know. I am ashamed of my ignor-
ance of history, of science, of languages, daily.
“All error,” .Dr. Johnson said, “is mean.”
And by this powerful shame doth God wonder-
fully indicate to us his intention that we shovfld
study and Jearn without end.

394

JOURNAL

[Acs z8

July 6, 1831.

All the great and good
And all the fair,

As if in JL disdainful mood

Forsake the world, and to the grave repair.

Is there a sage

Needed to curb the unruly, tinries, —

He hastes to quit the stage •*

And blushing leaves his country to its trimes.

Is there an angel, drest

In weeds ^f mortal beauty, wh^m lavish Heaven
With aK sweet perfections doth invest, —

It hastes to take what it hath ‘given.

And as the delicate snow

That latest fell, the thieving wind first takes.

So thou, dear wife, must go

As frail, as spotless as those new-fall’n flakes.

r

Let me not fear to die.

But let me live so well

As to win this mark of death from on high,

, That I with God, and thee, dear heart, may dwell.

I write the things that are
Not what appears j

KNOW THYSELF

395

V3>1

Of things as they are in#the eye of God
Not, in the eye of man.

FvSdl Scavrdi/

If thou canst bear
Strong meat of simple truth,

If thou durst my wo»ds compare
With what •thou thinkest in the soul’s free
you!h,

•Xhen take this fact unto thy soul, —

God dwells in thee.

It is no metaphor nor parable, ^

It is unknown to thousands, and to the#;

Yet there is God.*

t

He is in thy world.

But thy world knows him not.

He is the mighty Heart

From which life’s varied pulses part.

Clouded and shrouded there doth sit
The Infinite
Embosomed in a man ;

And thou art stranger to thy guest,

And know’st not what thou dost invest.

The clouds that veil his life within
Are thy thfck woven webs of sin,

Which his glory struggling through
Darkens to thine evil hue.

39^ JOURNAL [Age 2S

Then bear thyself, O man !

Up to the scale and compass of thy guest;

Soul of thy soul.

Be g;reat as doth beseem

The ambassador who bears

The royal presence where he goes.

Give up to thy soul —

Let it have its way —

It is, I tell thee, God hfmself.

The selfsame One that rules the Whole,

Tho* he speaks thro’ thee with a stiflfd voice.

And looks through thee, shorn of his beams.

But if thou listen to his voice.

If thou obey the royal thought^

It will grow clearer to thine ear,

More glorious to thine eye.

The clouds will burst that veil him now
And thou shalt see the Lord.

I

Therefore be great.

Not proud, — too great to be proud.

Let not thine eyes rove.

Peep not in corners ; let thine eyes
,Look straight before thee, as befits
The simplicity of Power.

And in thy closet carry state ;

Filled with light, walk therein ;

And, as a king

THE OVERSOUL

397

|83>J

Would do no treason to his^own empire.

So do nbt^thou to thine.

This is the reason wjiy thou dost reccfjgnizc
Things now first revealed.

Because in thee resides
The Spirit that lives in all ;

And thou canst fear^;! the laws of nature
Because iis*author is latent in thy breast.

• Therefore, O happy youth.

Happy if thou dost know and love this truth.
Thou art unto ihyself a law, ^

And since the soul of things is in theef
Thou needest nothing out of*thee.

The 1^, the gospel, and the Providence,
Heaven, Hell, tjie Judgment, and the stores
Immeasureable of Truth and Good,

All^these thou must find
Within thy single mind.

Or nc^er find.

Thou art the law ;

The gospel has ho revelation
Of peace or hope until there is response
From the deep chambers of thy mind thereto,-
The rest*is straw.

It can reveal no truth itnknown before.

The Providencf

39® JOURNAL [Age z€

Thou art thyself tlfat doth dispense
Wealth to thy work, want to thy sloth,

Glory to goodness, to neglect, the moth.

Thou sow’st the wind, tho whirlwind reapest.

Thou payest the wages

Of thy own work, through all ages.

The almighty energy within
Crowneth virtue, curseth shi..

Virtue sees by its own light ;

Stumbleth sin in self-made night.

Who approves thee doing right ?

God in thei?. •

Who condemns tljee doing wrong ?

God in thee.

Who punishes thine evil deed ?

God in thee. *

What is thine evil need ?

Thy worse mind, with error blind

And more prone to evil

That is, the greater hiding of the God within,

And next, the consequence
More faintly, as more distant, wrought
‘Upon our outward fortunes.

There is nothing else bdt God.
Where’er I look

1831] MORALS AND MIND 399

All thin|;s hasten back to hifti

Light is but his shadow dim.

Shall I ask wealth or^power of God, ^♦ho gave

An image of himself to be my soul ?

As well might swilling ocean ask a wave,

Or the starred firmament a dying coal, —

For that which is'in^c lives in the whole.

July 6, 1831.

•Bresident Monroe died on the fourth of
July, — a respectable man, I believe.

RELATION OF MORALS TO INTELBECT

Shaftesbury’s ,n]axim. That wisdom comes
more from the heart than the head. “ Do
the will, know tHb doctrines.” Impera parendo.
Obedience is the eye which reads th.' laws of
the universe. For the moral sense is the proper
keeper of the doors of knowledge ; whom he
will he lets in, and whom he will he shuts out.
A polemic, a partizan, for want of a candid
heart becomes ‘miserably ignorant of the whole
question.

The point of view is of more importance
than the sharpness of sight. Fenelon anticipated
Adam Smith. . . . The tye, too near, turns the
fairest proportions of architecture or of sculp-

400 JOURNAL [Age 2^

ture into deformity? Now goodness is the right
place of the mind.

Make known the law and you can disperfse
with collecting the particular instances. Kepler’s
' second (?) law was seen at once to contain, and
so make useless and ridiculous, all the tables that
were made or could be made, of falling bodies.

[advantage of the nineteenth qenturv]

I pay twenty or thirty dollars to the Govern-
ment of my Country a year. If I had lived be-
fore it was flisco.vered that we.cou/ci do without
a court, r should have paid twice as much, and
been otherwise troubled. If 'I. had lived earlier,
before some moral discoveries wero made, I
could not have sustained the 'independent fash-
ion of living I do for less than the support of
a giirrison of guards. For, plain gentleman as I
am, and living no better than a thousand per-
sons in this city, I do believe I live better than
any person, not a gentleman or knight, in
eleventh, twelfth or thirteenth' centuries. If I
had lived earlier, I must have been my own
guard, and that duty would have taken up all
my time, and left me none for speeulation, i.e.,
I should have been a savage. See then what
discoveries moral progress has made. . . .

GOOD WRITING

401

*33«]

THE RIGHT WORD

July 8.

i

•No man can write well who thinks there is
any choice of words for him. The laws of com-
position are as strict as those of sculpture and
architecture. There is always one line that ought
to be drawn, or one proportion that should be
kept, and ewy dther line or proportion is
wrong, and* so far wrong as it deviates from this.
So. iji writing, there is always a right word, and
every other than that is wrong. There is no
beauty in words ejccept in their collocation. The
effect of a fanciful word misplaced, is liRe that of
a horn, of exquisite* polish growing on a human
head.*

To the same purpose I find at this date in
Guesse^ at Truth, — “In good prose, (says
Schlegel) every word should be underline^”:
“no italics in Plato.” In good writing, every
word means something. In good writing, words
become one with things. I take up a poem ; if
I find that there is not a single line there nor
word but expresses something that is true for
me as well as for him ... it is adamant. Its
reputation will be slow, but sure from every
caprice of taste. No critic can hurt it, he will only
hurt himself by tilting against it. This is the

402 JOURNAL [Age %8

confidence we feel concerning Shalcspeare. We
know, Charles says, “ that his record is tme.”
And this is the ordeal which the new aspirant
Wordsworth must undergo. He has writ lines
that are like outward nature, so fresh, so simple,
so durable ; but whether all or half his texture
is as firm I doubt, though last evening (27 Oct.)
I read with high delight his Sonnets to Liberty.*

July 10.

Old English writers are the standards, not
because they are old, but sinjply‘ because they
wrote well. They deviated every day from other
people, but never from truth, and so we follow
them. If we write as well, we may deviate from
them and our deviations shall be classical.

“he invents who proves ”

Every man says a hundred things every day
that are capable of much more meaning than he
attaches to them. The Declaration of Independ-
ence, as Webster intimates, deserves its fame,
though every sentence had been somewhere said
before. That gave it Jlesh and flower. Not that
man is the abolisher of Slavery Qr Intemper-
ance who calls them ,evils, but he whose dis-
1 This last clause evidently was written in later.

^1831] THE SOUL’S SOLITUDE 403

cerning eye separates betvseen the existence of
society, a*nd these evils, and sees that these may
peel off and the institutions remain whole.

[solitude of the soul]

July 14.

One of the arguments with which nature fur-
nishes us for the* J no mortality of the Soul is, it
always seemed to me, the awful solitude in which
here a soul lives. Few*men communicate their
highest thoughts to any person. To many they
cannot, for, they are unfit receivers. Perhaps
they cannot to 5 ny. Yet are these* tjioughts as

much made for communication as a sex. Ellen

%

wondered why clearest friends, even husband
and wife, did so little impart their religious
thoughts. And how rarely do such friends
meet.'Here I sit alone from month to month
filled with a deep desire to exchange thoi^hts
with a friend who does not appear. Yet shall I
find, or refind, that friend. Sampson goes about,
yet never speaks what his soul is full of. Barnes
also; Mrs. Lee; Motte; S. A. R.* They can-

1 George Sampson, his young parishioner, a valued frieftd,
died soon after this time ; Barnes and Mrs. Lee were prob-
ably friends in^is parish. The Rev. Mellish Irving Motte was
a classmate. S. A. R. was Sanlh Aldcn, the wife of his Uncle
Ripley, a remarkable woman, and a dear friend through life.

404 JOURNAL [Aoe 28

not discharge this subtle electricity for defect of
medium or of receiver.

But was this glorious fabric made for nothing?
Will not its day and means and object come ?
Will not Heaven’s matches be made or restored ?

15-

«

Nothing more true tha 7 i the saying, “spirit-
ual things must be spiritually discerned.”

God in us worships God.

The thin’gs taught in colleges and schools are
not an education, but the means of education.

Fable that Love and Death exchanged arrows
by mistake.

PHI BETA KAPPA DAY

July 21, 1831. •
The feast is pleasant, but its joys have no after
life, and seem to be a subtraction from our mor-
tal work-day of so much. Why not follow out
the great idolatry, no, the penchant , of the
human mind for friendship ? Is itn,9t beautiful,
this yearning after its m^te — its mate, I mean, by
spiritual affinities, and not by sex. I never hear

/83i] ideal friendship 405

of a person of noble feelings but I have the emo-
tioi\of tht* moral sublime, such as is caused by
rtading Young’s line,

“ Forgive his crimes — forgive his virtues too,
Those*minor faults, half coi\verts to the right,”

or Shakspeare’s “ ‘The more angel she," * which
Coleridge quotes, T-^r Bacon’s sentence, — Ani-
mum qui generosos fines semel optaverit, non vir-
tutes solum sed et Numina circumstant. Et? oltavo^
dpia‘To<i, etc.^ I put together these with pleasure
as two or three specimens of that peculiar and
beautiful class ot thoughts which sit you aglow.
Non*verba sed toi\itrua audits. Well, just such a
feeling I have in hearing of C. G. L’s or J. A’s,J
or anybody clse’s noble sentiments.

Now if surely I knew there was a mind some-
where thinking and willing, that is a repository
of these sentiments, a hive of chosen knowledge,
*a knowir and lover of the golden laws of the in-
tellect and the heart; and that in future I am to

1 Othello, aftcF smothering Desdcmona, says to her waiting-
woman, ** You heard her say herself it was not I,” t# which
Emilia answers, O, the more angel she, and you the bijvrker
devil

2 Hcctor ’1 speech, One omen is ever good, — to de-
fend one’s country.” •

3 Charles Greeley Loring, and John Adams.

4o6 journal [Age 28

meet this mind in connexions of most cheerful
and close fellowship, should not 1 be glad ? Yes,
indeed : the rainbow, the evening star, day, night,
storm, sorrow, death, they would seem prepa-
rations, they would seem subjects for this deli-
cious conversation. When I think of you, sweet
friend, wife, angel Ellen, on whom the spirit of
knowledge and the spirit of h6pe w(=*re poured in
equal fulness, when I think of you, I am sure we
have not said everlasting farewells.

The impulses of a heart of faultless sentiments
would be as much an object of exact calculation
as the effects of caloric or azote.

How very thin are the disguises of action !
These men that came to-day to »I> B K, came with
their purposes writ as legibly on every propo-
sition as if they had said, “ I wish an audience
when I hold forth ” ; another, “ I hate Everett ” ;
another, “ I am an anti-mason ” ; another, “ I*
love young men” ; another, “ Truth.”. . .

A rich man may lawfully have hamdsome house
and furniture. He is doing better with his money
for* the world than if he gave it to the beggar.
But he must adorn his house with the principle
of /ove running through, every detail.

|83i] possessions— power 407

“ ’Tis use alone which sanctifies expense

And spieadour borrows all its rays from sense.”

jf^ll possessions that end in self are ojlious. The
man who shuts himsibifupin solitary splendour
hath much’of the devil in him, . . . Books are
to be read, and every library should be a circu-
lating library. Pictures are to be seen, and are
as if they wore no*t, when unseen, and palaces
have no other use. . . .

[the real power]

. . . Mo 2 t kijigs and presidents^ by title are
merely clerks of some real power whith stands
erect |it their side and subjugates them. Crom-
well find, Buonaparte are men in my mind far
more respectable ‘than James I. of England or
George IV. For if they used hypocrisv to rise
by, they rose more by the energy of their pwn
will, and though thoroughly selfish they scorned
a servile selfishness, — they took off the slave’s
cloak when they had got up and tossed it down
in the face of all the mob below. They kicked
the ladder down, crush whom it might. Whilst
these other gentlemen (and wo is me, my Coun-
try, many gveat gentlemen in thy chairs) sit with
it on. If I want a favour»of the President of the
United States I need not cultivate his personal

4o8 journal [Age 28

kindness, I will ask<.it of his President, the bad
party in the country, and if they say-yea, I shall
be sure of Mr. Jackson’s bow and smile and sign
manual. Whilst I admire Cromwell and Buona-
parte, however, for the simplicity and- energy of
their evil, I lose my reverence the moment 1
consider their ends. I see they. were both wholly
mistaken, blind as beetles, ...

Power is a trust. So also is genius or every
degree of wisdom.

Dined with President Adams.yesterday at Dr,
Parkman’s.

[god misrepresented]

Mr. said to a woman doubting, — “ Do

you not fear God ? Does not the feeling that
your whole future destinies for happiness or mis-
ery are in his hands terrify you ? ” She said.
No, she wished it did.” The question was
false theology. It does not recognize an immut-
able God. It was for the woman to become
happy or miserable, not for God to make her
so.‘

GOD

409

1831]

[god’s door]

July 29, 1831.

Suicidal is this distrust of reason ; this fear to
think ; this doctrine that ’t is pious to believe
oh other’s words, impious to trust entirely to
yourself. To think is to receive. Is a man
afraid that the faculties which God made can
outsee God, can find more than he made, or dif-
ferent, can bring any report hostile to himself?
To reflect is to receive truth immediately from
God without’any .medium. That is living faith.
To take on trust certain facts is a dead faith, in-
operative. A trust -in yourself is the height, not
of pritle, but of piety, an unwillingness to learn
of any but God himself. It will come only to
one who feels that he is nothing. It is by your-
self without ambassador that God speaks to you.
You are as one who has a private door that
leads him to the king’s chamber. You have
learned nothing rightly that you have not
learned so.

God does not use personal authority. It is
the direct effect of all spiritual truth to abrogate,
nullify, perspnal authority, — to make us love
the virtue and the person exactly by the mea-
sure of his virtues, but not to honour the inher-

410 JOURNAL [Age 28

ent evils for the sake of any person. He is no
respecter of persons. And that is> the wrong
whereby theology has injured Jesus Christ, in-
sisting upon a love to him as a duty. Nobody
will ever be loved by compulsion. Love is the
reward of loveliness. Tell not me to love my
saviour. No, do him not that injustice. But
fill me with his goodness and I shall love him,
of course. Make me as pure, as meek, as useful,
and I shall love him as certainly as a stone falls.

“ The progress of custom {consuetudo) is arith-
metical, of Nature, geometrical.” Bacon.

“We think after nature; we speak after rules;
we act after custom.” Bacon.

“Manifest merits procure 'reputation, occult
ones, fortune.” Bacon.

August 15.

The world becomes transparent to wisdom.
Everything reveals its reason within itself. The
threads of innumerable relations are seen run-
ning from part to part and joining remotest
points of time and space.

I read verses to-day of Thomrs Campbell
about the Poles, which are alive. Most of the
“Pleasures of Hope” has no life : dead verses.

1831] JUSTIFIED BOOKS 411

August 16.

Every tcynposition in prose or verse should
cantain in itself the reason of its appearance.
Thousands of volun^es have been Written and
ipould in Jibraries of which this reason is yet
ft) seek, does not appear. Tnen comes Adam
Smith, Bacon, Burke, Milton ; then comes any
good sentenc^, and* its apology is its own worth.
It makes its pertinence.

[man’s reputation]

There is »n engine at Waltham to watch the
watchmen of the factory. Ever^ hoflr^hey must
put ^ ring on to tlje wheel, or if they fall asleep
and rfo not, the ‘machine will show their neglect
and which hcTur J:hey slept. Such a machine is
every man’s Reputation.

[the younger adams]

August 16.

Yesterday I heard John Quincy Adams de-
liver an eulogy upon President Monroe. But
he held his notes so close to his mouth that he
could be ill heard. 'I'here was nothing heroic»in
the subject^ and not much in the feelings of the
orator, so it proved rather a spectacle than a
speech.

JOURNAL

[Age 2$

41a

September 7.

,I think it better to drink water than cider pr
ale. I think two cups of tea better than three.
SCentandum est.

[silence, speech, poverty]

Loquendi magistros babe.aiis homineSy tacendi
DeoSy apud Jeremy Taylor. And Plutarch said
excellently, ^ui generate et regio more institu-
untury primum tacere, deinde loqui discunt. (“ To
be taught first to be silent, then t.o speak well
and handsomely, is education fit for a prince.”)

Nil habet infeli» paupertas^ durius in se quam
quod ridicules homines facit.

EDUCATION

September 13, 1831.

The things which are taught children are not
an education, but the means of education. The
grammar and geography and writing do not train
up the child in the way it should go, but may be
used in the service of the devil.

'Education is the drawing out the soul.

i93i]DEATH — SUNDAY SCHOOLS413
[equanimiiy]

September 14.

Mr. Walker* said in conversation that th*e

s

information that death'must probably take place
soon, commonly gave steadiness to the mind and
enabled it to do what was fit with more ability.
The mind, he said,Jieyer plays false. It is always
equal to all it js cal'fed to meet.

[who knoweth ?]

The first questions still remain to be asked
after all the pVogrpss of science.^ What an abyss
is my ignorance.

SUNDAY SCHOOLS

September 14, 1831.

Robert Raikes and Mrs. Catherine Cappe the
founders of Sunday Schools fifty years ago; Mrs.
C. a little the first. Raikes saw the word try, as
it were, written before him. Now 2,000,000 chil-
dren attend them, in four continents.

» •

Everyman’s gauge

I suppose a skilful judge of character would
get some measure of the whole from the smallest
actions and from trifling conversation. All would

I Rev. James Walker, later. President of Harvard College.

414 JOURNAL [Age 58

be arcs, however small, of the same circle, and
from them the whole circumference' migjit be
drawn. The swing of his arm, however fe’ee
and violent, is determined* mathematically by the
length of the bones. Every motion, bears some
proportion to t^ie fixed size and form of his
whole frame, and so the measure of his mind
determines as accurately evtry wqrd he utters.

MIRACLES

It is impossible that omnipotence should make
a ball pass from one point to ajjotlfer point with-
out passhig through a space equal to the straight
line betwixt them’ This necessity the mirid per-
ceives. Does not the same necessity make* Leib-
nitz’s law of continuity manifest? If we knew
more of matter, would not this absurdity strike
us as lying against miracles ? I think it would in
the common understanding of them. Let then a
miracle be the effect of far greater knowledge of
the laws of nature and so a superior command of
nature. Imperat parendo.

COMPENSATION

Is it not one of the most thrilling truths of
moral science that I write below ? The savage of
the Sandwich Islands believes that whenever he

,831] HERBERT — VERSIFYING 415

overcomes and slays an enemy, the strength and
prowess of 'that enemy passes into him.* The
soul instructed by God, knows, that whenever it
overcomes a temptatibn, it becomes stronger by
the strength of that temptation. But for heaven’s
sake do not (to use the vulgar expression) “ treat ”
your resolution. Haec est mors mea.

t

It is my» opinion that, because of the law “ that
evety truth you receive’ prepares the mind for
the reception of unknown truth,” * . . .

RHETORIC

September 1 5.

I often make the criticism on my friend Her-
bert’s diction, that his thought has that heat as
actuall,y to fuse the words, so that language is
wholly flexible in his hands and his rhyme never
stops th^ progress of the sense. And, in gen-
eral, according to the elevation of the soul will
the power over language always be, and lively
thoughts will Freak out into spritely verse. No
measure so difficult but will be tractable, so

I This image occurs in ** Compensation/’ in Essays L

1 Here fbllcJws in the Journal the passage on the inability
of a teacher to hide his own* view, printed in Spiritual
Laws/* Essays /, Centenary Ed,, p. 146,

41 6 JOURNAL [Aci »8

that you only get ‘up the temperature of the
thought.

To this^ point I quote gladly my old gosSip
Montaigne; “For my pirt I hold, and Socra-
tes is positive in it, that whoever has in his
mind a spritely and clear imagination, he will
express it well enough in one kind or another,
and, though he were dumb,‘ by sighs.”

Verbaque praevisam rem non invita sequentur.

Horace;

And again Seneca, Cum res atiimum occupa-
verBy ver^ifambiunt.

And CJfcero, Ipsa res verba rapiunt.

#

“ Oh how that name inspired my styj^e !

The words come skelpin.rank and file
Amaist before I ken ! ” Burns.

I am glad to have these learned Thebans
confirm my very thought.

September 21.

Pestalozzi, a venerable name, after witnessing
the events of the French Revolution, concluded
in 1797, “That the amelioration of outward
circumstances will be the effect, but never can
be the means of mental and moral improve-
ment,” a paralogism to the old words, “ Seek
ye first the kingdom of God and his righteous-

1831] LAW — THE ROYAL MINE 417

ness, and all these things ^hall be added unto
you.”

[the law infinite]

Chardon St., September 30, i8ji.

Pleasant it is to the soul, painful it is to the
conscience, to recognize wherever you go the
fixed eternity of. moral laws. You cannot be
too kind, you cannot be too just. There is no
excess of-observance: be kind in the stage, be
kii^d in the pew, keep your word, be kind in a
quarrel. Bear yourself so on all occasions, saith
one, that thd opposer may beware of thee. Jesus
says, so bear yourself as if your tra^e and busi-
ness ,was to serve that man. Don’t lose this
principle a moment. And your character will be
its commentary and exposition

' A dull uncertain brain,

But gifted yet to know
That God has seraphim who go
Singing an immortal strain.

Immortal here below.

I knowihe mighty bards,

I listen when they sing ;

And more I know

The^secret store

Which these explore

When they with torch of genius pierce

4i8 journal [Age2&

The tenfold clfuds that cover
The riches of the Universe
From God’s adoring lover.

And fi'to me it is not given
To bring one ingot thence
Of that unfading gold of heaven
His merchants may dispense,

Yet well I know the rcyarmine,

And know the sparkle of its ore*

Celestial truths froqj lies that shine' ‘ —
Explored they teach us to explore.

[nIjn-resistance]

October 2 •

I wish the Christian principle, the uljra {)rin-
ciple of non-resistance and returning good for
ill, might be tried fairly. William Penn made
one trial. The world was not ripe, and yet it
did well. An angel stands a poor chance among
wild beasts; a better chance among men : but
among angels best of all. And so I admit of
this system that it is, like the Free Trade, fit
for one nation only on condition that all adopt
it. ' Still a man may try it in his own person,

I A later version printed in the Appendij^ to the Poems
gives this line better : — *■

Know Heaven's truth from lies that shine.

NON-RESISTANCE

V831]

419

and even his sufferings by aeason of it shall be
its tpumphs. “The more falls it gets, moves
falter on.” Love is the adamantean shield tlfat
makes blows ridicuteus. If B'dward Everett
were a sanguine philanthropist, not a shade
w'ould attach to his name from the insults of
Platt; but he is thought a selfish man, so by
his own law must he be judged ; the Mussul-
man by the Koran ; the Jew by the Pentateuch.

•Qne thing more; it said that it strips the
good man bare and leaves him to the whip and
license of piAtes,and butchers^ Rut I suppose
the exaltation of the general mmd bx*the influ-
ence 9f the principle will be a counteraction of
the increased license. Not any influence acts
upon the highest "man but a proportion of the
same gets down to the lowest man. Signboards
speak of Titian ; a regular ladder of communi-
cating m^ds from Webster down to Joe Cash.

CREEDS

People wouW teach me what they think con-
cerning modes of Justification, and how their
supposed offices of Christ are compatible with tAe
P'ather’s dignity, etc. Will they teach me how
to resist my temptations*? Will they teach me
how to be a good man ? I have nothing to do

420 JOURNAL [Age eS

with their creeds. is more than I can do now
to keep the commandments. Yet they want more
than these. I can’t keep these. Can they? Jo
they? I think they have no idea how much is
contained in them. Yea, Calvinism lays the salve
to this very sore, and says. Because you can’t keep
them, here is Blood to expiate; only give your
assent; and it produces no higher. level of obe-
dience in the multitude than in the professors
of another faith. “ All that is simple is enough
for all that’s good.” Don’t meddle with others,
nor with high beliefs, but strictly keep your own
soul. Try to keep the ten commandments a day.
You will find they mean enough literally. Well,
then take them with the New Testament expo-
sition and keep them from the heart.

Boston, October 21, 1831.

People . . . talk with a sneer of those who
comfort themselves for the evils of life by an im-
aginary heaven ; and they rightly ridicule them
who thus do. But Christians do it not. Their
heaven is prophesied in their virtuous purpose,
and begins in their first deliberate virtuous ac-
tion, and is established in their virtuous habit. It
is not a false or imagina*-y heaven; . . . Every
man, as far as his virtue goes, says it is good ; he

V83I] HEAVEN BEGINS HERE 421

cleaves to it amidst his wickedness, blasphemy,
scof^ng and stupidity. He gets credit for it, he
l(>ves it, he does not abhor himself because of
it, — of this grain of antidote to his evils. Take
it out and ‘he would hang himself. ...

**Is it not good to have right opinions ; to un-
derstand one’s seif; to know what is and what
is not ? Met\ think that instead they are to take
religious truth on trust. Impossible ; not on the
word of God himself. Truth is never crammed
down your throat, but is to be understood. Have
you not guafantge enough in your^own consti-
tution for the discretion of (jod? *•. . Well,
this i§ apart of heaven : to know as we are known,
to see what is now hid, to have every secret thing
work out its full effect.

“ Jle that made the heart, shall not he under-
stand ? ”

[light from within]

Boston, October 24, 1831.

“ Admiration ennobles and blesses those who
feel it. The ItTver is made happier by his love
than his mistress can be. Like the song of the
bird, it cheers his own heart. Why are we com-
manded to give glory to God unless that we our-
selves may be made godly.”

Guesses at T'ruth (vol. n, p. 115).

422 JOURNAL [Age tV

“ Glory is a light' that shines from us on oth-
ers and not from others on us.” ‘Landcr.

1 , . . /

See Quincy’s Definition.

" Some minds^ think about thin'gs ; othei's
think the things themselves.” Schelling.

Augur cum esset Cato^ diene auiUs est^ optimis
auspiciis ea geri, quae pro reipublicae ialute gere-
rentur; quae contra rempublicam ferrentur, contra
auspicia ferri. Cicero, De Senectute, 4, 4.

El? oliavos a/j'O'To?, etc. And it is like Web-
ster’s skill in law, who knows what it is (i. e.,
what it should be), and Stofy can tell the au-
thorities.

SHAKSPEARE

[OneJ thing strikes me in the sonnets, ”'hirb
in their way seem as wonderful as the plays, and
perhaps are even more valuable to thf» analysis
of the genius of Shakspeare, and that is the as-
similating power of passion that turns all things
to its own nature. See sonnet, — “ O never say
th;it I was false of heart,” etc. and sonnet
“ Since I left you mine eye is in my mind,” or
“From you have I been absent in the spring,”
or “ What is your substance, whereof are you
made ? ”

Ni83i] SHAKSPEARE’S sonnets 423

And then see the immcfttality of the human
spirit in them, for who but an eternal creature
could so think and express himself a^ in, “ If my
dear love were but tlie child of state,” or “ No
^Hme,” et’c. And listen to jhe stern morality
that seems to inform them all and to be pre-
sent in the eye of t^e poet, even when contra-
dicted in tlte expression : but present in spirit
and lettef in “ The expense of spirit in a waste
of shame,” etc., or “ Poor soul ! ” etc.

thekla’s son« ‘

^ •

“ The clouds arc flying, the wopds are ^ghing,
The,1naiden is walking the grassy shore,

And as the wa\(e breaks, with might, with might,

She singeth aloud in the darksome night
i^i^y^tear is in her troubled eye.

“ For th(^ world feels cold, and the heart gets old,
And reflects the bright aspect of nature no more, —
Then take back thy child. Holy Virgin, to thee,

I have plucke(h<he one blossom that hangs on earth’s
tree,

I have lived, I have loved, and die.”

I Translatton from Schiller’s Wallenstein^ Edinburgh Re-
view, Oct., 1830. See same dumber for Geological Article.

424

JOURNAL

[Act aS'

THE soul’s worship

October 27./

What we love that shall we seek. . . . The
heart is the sole world, the universe', and if its
wants are satisfied, there is no defect perceiveHli
But how little love is at the. bottom of these
great religious shows ; congfegations and tem-
ples and sermons, — how much sham! Love
built them, to be surd. Yea, they were j:he
heart’s work ; but the fervent generation that
built them passed away, thingswwen’t downward,
and the foipis refnain, but the soul is well nigh
gone. Calvinism stands, feat J, by pride, and
ignorance; and Unitarianism, as a sect, stands
by the opposition of Calvinism. It is cold and
cheerless, the mere creature of the understand-
ing, tjntil controversy makes it warm with fire
got from below. But is there no diffei-ence in
the objects which the heart loves? Is there no
truth ? Yes. And is there no power in truth to
commend itself? Yes. It alone c^n satisfy the
heart. Are we asking you to love God as if
there was any arbitrary burden from duty im-
posed, as if we said. Apart from your usual
loves come and cultivate this. It is sour, but it
must be done, for such is the hard law. — No;

THK JiKC'OND CHI Ri H OF BOSTON

Old N*>rth ” in Hanover btrcci, Mhcrc hmerson was Pastor

h83i] the SOUL’S WORSHIP 4^5

•

.God forbid; we call you •to that which all
things cal! you unto with softest persuasion, to
thfiit which your whole Reasoh enjoins with Ab-
solute sovereignty. We call you to* that which
aU the future shall teach far more forcibly and
si'rfl^ly than we now. These tlfings are true and
real and grand and lovely and good.

Is it not ajl in us, how strangely ! Look at
this congregation of men; — the words might
betoken, — though nt>w there be none here
to speak them, — but the words might be said
that would rrtake, them stagger a;id reel like a
drunken man. Who doubts it^^Wer^you ever
instfvycted by a wise and eloquent man ? Re-
meniTser.then, were not the words that made
your blood run cold, that brought the blood to
yo ur cheeks, that made you tremble or de-
ligi ted you, — did they not sound to ybJ as
old as yjaurself? Was it not truth that you
knew before, or do you ever expect to be moved
from the pulpit or from man by anything but
plain truth? ‘Never. It is God in you that
responds to God without, or affirms his own
words trembling on the lips of another.

426 JOURNAL [Age 28

November y 1831.

Have been at the Examination of Derry
Academy, and had some sad, some pleasant
thoughts.'

Is it not true that every man has before him
in his mind room in one direction to which
there is no bound, but in every other direction
he runs against a wall in a shore time ? One
course of thought, affection, action is for him
— that is his use, as the new men say. Let me
embark in political economy, in repartee, in
fiction, in ve.^e, in practical counsels (as here
in the Der.y case) and I am soon run aground ;
but let my bark head its own way toward the
law of laws, toward the compensation or action
and reaction of the moral universe, and I sweep
serenely over God’s depths in an infinite •'“a

In an unknown wood the traveller gives the
reins to his horse, seeks his safety in the in-
stincts of the animal. Trust something to your
instincts far more trustworthy. As there is al-
ways a subject for life, so there is always a sub-
ject for each hour, if only a man has wit enough

I The occasion of Mr. Emerson’s attending the Examina-
tion seems to have been that a young kinswoman of his wife,
Elizabeth Tucker, lived there, and was one of the scholars.
Next year he wrote her a letter of advice as to her reading.

1831] COMPOSURE 427

to find what that is. I sit* Friday night and
note *the fifst thought that rises. Presently
andther, presently five or six,* — of all these I
take the mean^ as the subject for Saturday’s
sefmon.

^ [wait]

November 4.

God is notin a hurry. Don’t be impatient of
riding in a sftage coach and talking less religiously
thin»the orthodox passenger, and wish yourself
shown to them doing something, because you
would act as a religious being, ^j^i^gh it is not
in you to talk after their mannerT Go<f will pro-
vide*gpportunities. "Calmly wait. Now is an op-
portunit)^. Yoij can’t be true to their principles,
but you can to yoiirs now in sitting with them.
i^QlllhMunderstanding of religion is that it is
doing right from a right motive. Stick tojt^at
mighty sanse. Don’t affect the use of an adverb
or an epithet more than belongs to the feeling
you have.

November 5, Friday.

As religious philosophy advances, men wjll
cAse to say “ the Future State ” and will say in-
stead “ the whole being.” The aim of the wise
man will always be to sef his tune on such a key
as can hold, to Ijring his life level with the laws of

428 JOURNAL [Ace 28

the mind, not of the body, because those endure.
Third Sunday of December I exchange with Mr.
Barlow. Second Sunday of March Mr. Francis.

i

ROBERT BURNS

“ But fare you weel, auld Nickie-ben !

O wad ye tak’ a thought and men’ !

Ye aiblins might — I dinna ken —

Still hae a stake.

I ’m wae to think upon yon den,

Ev’n for your sake ! ”

If it be comical, yet it belpngs to the moral
sublime. ^

“ Thy tuneful flame still careful fan,

Preserve the dignity of man
With soul erect j
And trust the Universal Plan
Will all protect.”

He tells the mouse that he is his ** fellow-mor-
tal.” The whole mouse piece is capital and this
sublime : —

“ Still thou art blest compared with me,

The present only toucheth thee,

But och! I backward cast my ee
On prospects drear, *

An’ forward, tho* I canna see,

I guess and fear.” ,

WORDSWORTH

429

» 83 «]

November 18.

As respite from the affair, read Words-

w^orth: River Duddon; Ode to Duty; Rob
excellent, much hapfpier diction than ordinary.
The Poet's Epitdphy fine account of the Poet.

“You must love him ere to you
He will seem worthy of your love.” . . .

But mjserable is the last verse, and the in-
tended thought poorly*half-conveyed. But sub-
lime is the severe, eternal strain called Dion.
What they say pf Laodamia were better said of
this, i. e., about being read to^f^ro*e£» and demi-
gods. Are not things eterna? exactly in the pro-
portion,in which they enter inward into nature;
eternal according to their /wness?

*“ For deathless powers to verse belong,

And they like demigods are strong
Qn whom the muses smile.”

Wordsworth.

So also such a line as this [in Dion^ :

Intent to trace the ideal path of right

More fair than heaven’s broad pathway paved with Stars

Which Dion learned to measure with delight.

So excellent also is the piece called the Happy
Warrior. Come up, William Wordsworth, al-

430 JOURNAL. [Age 28-

most I can say Coleridge’s compliment, quern
quoties legOy non verba mihi videor audire, sed (oni-
triia. His noble distinction is that he seeks the
truth and shuns with brave self-denial every
image and word that is from thffe purpose, meanj
to stick close to his own thought and give it in
naked simplicity and so make ic God’s affair, not
his own whether it shall succeed. But he fails of
executing this purpose fifty times for the sorry
purpose of making a rhfme in which he has no
skill, or from imbecility of mind losing sight of
his thought, or. from self-surrender to custom in
poetic diction (e. g., the inconsistency with his
own principles in the two lines ^bout the Cestus
and Thunderer’s eye, &c. vol. iii, p. 27).

He calls his brother “ a silent poet.”

And almost every moral line in his book
might be framed like a picture, or graven on a
temple porch, and would gain instead <?f losing
by being pondered.

November 19.

I apologized for his baby pieces to my mother
by saying he was Agesilaus, who rode on a cane
with his children. She said that Agesilaus did not
ride out of doors.

.1831] SCHOOL COMMITTEE 431

t

November 21.

Spoke with Messrs. Baxter, Foster and Moore
a 4 » the gate of Mayhew School. They all came
into my study, Mr.’Foster agreed to meet the
committee at the School house at twelve o’clock,
but did not appear. While the committee waited

there, Mr. Allen* came in to inform Mr.

of the threats, efc. So it was agreed that I
should request of the mayor a peace officer,
which I did.

November 22.

Marriage of O. L. Emerson.^ • -

PRAYER

November 23, 1831.

^^^^^^connexion with the great doctrines of
Compensation or Reaction, we get the besf in-
sight into the theory of prayer. It teaches that
prayer does not at all consist in words, but
wholly is a state of mind. Consider it also in
connexion with the doctrine that God is in the
soul of man, and w’e shall make another step
towards truth. For it is not to be expected tliat
God should gratify any man in an unreasonable
request, only because be asks it violently, but
precisely in proportion as a man comes into

432 JOURNAL [Age 28

conformity with God, he asks right things, or
things which God wills, and which therefore are
dofie. And when he is wholly godly, or the un-
folding Gocf within him has subdued all to him-
self, then he asks what God wills and nothing
else, and all his prayers are granted. In this
sense the promises of Christ to his disciples
may be understood. Were they * not rather
admonitions that they should bind,* or they
should loose, as God (vould ? And I easily
believe that Elijah or Peter or John, uplifted
in a rapture ofdevotion, thought with the mind
of God for the nfoment and so the miracle was
wrought.

Foede in bunc mundum intraviy anxie vixi, per-
turbatus egredior. Causa causarum miser ere jneiJ
(Aristotle’s reputed death speech.)

It is a curious compensation to be noticed of
such as I, that those who talk when everybody
else is silent are forced to be silent when every-
body else talks.’

November 25.

Read Muller, vol. i, with great pfeasure.

I Compare second verse of »' Compensation, ” Pttmt.

COMPENSATION

433

\83i]

.[elevation in sorrow]

"^ay I not value my griefs, and store them
up? I am imprisoned* in the forms and uses of
evjery day, and cannot surrender myself to the
sweet bitterness of lamenting “my beauty, my
glory, the life of my life.

The glory of acuing from the feeblest right
motive and seeing the compensations of the
moral universe justify you to coldest Reason
in the simultaneous elevation of the character.

Ascend a mile where you will, and, the barome-
ter indicates the same levity off^r. li^fse to the
same ’height of motive in wliat unfavourable
circufhstajices soever, and you belong to the
family of lofty ‘spirits, are adopted into them,
ennobled by their title, enrolled in their rank
^ncT chapter on God’s book, and forever ^o tie
treated as one of them by them, and by all,
even though God, for this present, separates
you from them, though you never saw one of
them, though your lot be low and hard and
contemned and insulted by those whose un-
happy eyes cannot see you through the dis-
guise of low^ condition. This is the oil of joy
for mourning.

434 JOURNAL [Age eE

December 2, 1831.

The day is sad, the night is carefui, the heart
is' weighed down -with leads. What shall hq.do
who would belong to th2 universe, “ and live
with living nature a pure rejoicing thing ? ” O
friend that said \hese words, are you conscious
of this thought and this writer? I would not
ask any other consolation than to .be assured by
one sign that the heart never plays false to it-
self when, in its scope, it requires by a necessity
the permanence of the soul.

[subjects]

December 3.

The boys in the streets say to each other,
“ Dick, toss the ball to me, know we,” which
seems to argue a confidence of each child in its
own worthiness of love. If it was known to tnc
bottom it must be loved. It is not less, I sup-
pose, true of men, if they were known out and
out, through and through, they would be more
loved than now; many dark steps would be
explained. Is this a kinder philosophy than that
of the antideception sermon? I write the things
that are, not what appears.

Write upon the several classes of ignorant
men, and upon the wise man. Wisdom is in-

•4.830 matter for sermons 435

sight. Ignorance is outwar^ sight. The enter-
prising, shrpwd, learned, scoffing Ignorant,

‘Whose mind is but the mind of his^own eyes,
He is a slave.”

So ‘love of nature. I'he soul* and the body of
things are harmonized ; therefore, the deeper
one knowetb the «oul, the more intense is the
love of oytward nature in him.

December lo.

Write upon tlje coincidence of first and third
thoughts, and apply it to aft'aik?; ai^drfo religion
an<J §kepticism. I should liktfto know if any one
ever went up on a mountain so high is that he
overlooked ri^hband wrong and saw them con-
founded, saw their streams mix, that justice did
not mean anything to his mind.

Unevenness of character. Every man is one-
half of a man, either benevolent and weak, or
firm and unbenevolent ; either a speaker and no
doer, or a doer and no speaker, either contem-
plative or practical, and excellence in any one
l^ind seems to speak defect in the others. This
wisely ordgred for the social state ; and the indi-
vidual expectation and,effort seems to promise
completeness of character in the whole future.

436 JOURNAL [Age 2.8

Our very defects ire thus shadows of our vir-
tues.

'Opposition of first thoughts and common
opinion. God has the first-word. The devil has
the second, but God has the last vvord. We dir-
trust the first thought because we can’t give the
reason for it. Abide by it, there is a reason, and
by and by, long hence, perhaps it will appear.

How we came out of silence into this sound-
ing world is the wondei of wonders. All other
marvels are less.

Charles* has gone away to Porto Rico.' God
preserve and restore him. '

I To visit Edward, who, though his mental balance was re-
stored, was really a broken man. In hope of recovery he had
taken some clerical position in a business house at San Juaii

I see him with superior smile.

Hunted by Sorrow^s grisly train.

In lands remote, in toil and pain.

With angel patience labour on
With the high port he bore cre-while
When, foremost of the youthful band.

The prizes in all lists he won,

Nor bate one jot of heart or hope ;

And least of all the loyal tic

Which holds to honre ^neath every sky.

‘Mn Memoriam E. B. E,’* Poems^

.1831] ORDER — SELF-COMMAND 437

^hen you confer a fa^ur, be very careful
how you dq it. It must be done with the remem-
b|;ance of your own squirming when you hive
received one. And feel that the whble difficulty

bes in receiving, not in giving.'

* •

.Memoranda. Committee of Evangelical Trea-
sury concertyng pe^s of American U nitarian As-
sociation.^ Mr. Thayer, and Kahler; also solicit-
ing subscriptions committee. Pemberton fund
for Miss ; . . . Tuesday, House of Industry.

Nothing done at random.i*No* accidents in
nature. You go oyt of a citwand come to social
disflrdej and wilderness, never get out of God's
city. Order, ‘order everywhere, morals para-
mount, equality of number of the sexes, propor-
fion of vegetable and animal life.

December 14, 1831.

It will not do to indulge myself. Philosopher
or Christian, whatever faith you teach, live by it.
Who opposes me, who shuts up my mouth, who
jjiinders the flow of my exhortation ? MySelf,

1 Such wai Mr. Emerson’s desire to sund on hit own feet
that it was a little hard for him to receive a favour or gift, all
through life.

438 JOURNAL [Age z8

only myself. Cannot I conform myself to my
principles ? Set the principles as lowj as loose
as ^ou please, set the tune not one note higher
than the truh pitch, but after settling what they
shall be, stick to them.

t

PAROCHIAL VISITS

t December 1 9.

When I talk with the sick they sometimes
think I treat death with unbecoming indifference
and do not make the case my own, or, if I do,
err in my judgment. I do not fear death. I be-
lieve those y ho fear it have borrowed the terrors
through which the^ see it from vulgar opipipn,
and not from their own minds. My own rhind
is the direct revelation which I have from God
and far least liable to mistake in telling his will
of any'revelation. Following my own thoughts,
especially as sometimes they have moved me in
the country (as in the Gulf Road in Vermont),
I should lie down in the lap of earth as trust-
ingly as ever on my bed. But the terror to many
persons is in the vague notions of what shall fol-
low death. The judgment, an uncertain judgmeiv
to be passed upon them, — whether, they shall
be saved ? It ought to boconsidcred by them that
there is no uncertainty about it. Already they

1831] TIME — AGE — ACTION 439

m4y know exactly what their spiritual con-
dition. .* . He will not suffer his holy one to
Sge corruption. . . . What -are your source* of*
satisfaction ? If they are meats and drinks, dress,
gossip, revengfe, hope of wealth, they must per-
isiT with the body. If they &re contemplation,
kind affections, admiration of what is admirable,
self-command, seJf-improvement,then they sur-
vive death and will make you as happy then as
how.

December ao.

“ Time vfas l^is estate.” {Italian Philosopher y
Johnson, vol. v.) “Daily sei?^surp|»t.”

Alexander 33 years. 30 years, age of having
done most. Scipio, Hannibal.

Revivals wrought in a moment, great 'discov-
eries, great thoughts, great deeds.

It only takes a moment to die, or to kill.
What can’t then be done in a year? Life long
enough for any good purpose: a year long
enough.

“Action comes les?«near to vital truth than
description.” Plato, Republic^ Book v.

44^ JOURNAL [Ace 28

f

** Poetry is something more philosophical and
excellent than history.”

Aristotle, Poetkoy ch. 10.

When you throw a stone, the way to hit the
mark is to look at the mark and not consider
how you swing your arm. When you speak
extempore, you must carry your thought to the
person opposite and never think of the manner.

TO MISS EMERSON

Deosmber ac.

• 's'

What frcim th^ woods, the hills, and the en-
veloping heaven ? What from the interior prpa-
tion, — if what is within be not the creator.? How
many changes men ring on these two words in and
out. It is all our philosophy. "Fake them away,
and what were Wordsworth or Swedenborg?
The rough and tumble old fellows. Bacons, Mil-
tons, and Burkes, don’t wire-draw. That ’s why
I like Montaigne. No effeminate parlour work-
man is he, on an idea got at an evening lecture
or a young men’s debate, but roundly tells what
he saw, or what he thought of when he was ridr
ing horse-back or entertaining a tcoop at his
chateau. A gross, semisavage indecency debases
his book, and ought doubtless to turn it out of

,831] MONTAIGNE 441

• • •

dmrs ; but the robustness his sentiments, the
generosifiy of his judgments, the downright truth
without fear or favour, I do. embrace with botK
arms. Itis wild and^vouryassweet*fern. Henry
yill. loved to see a many and it is exhilarating,
orjce in a while, to come across a genuine Saxon
stump, a wild, virtuous man who knows books,
but gives thf m thoif right place in his mind, lower
than hi§ ^reason. Books are apt to turn reason
out of doors. You find men talking everywhere
from their memories, instead of from their un-
derstanding* If I stole this thought from Mon-
taigne, as is very likely, I dqjrt’t Arg. I should
have said the san\e myself.

Boston, December 28, 1831.

The year hastens p its close. ^Vhat is it to
Ine ?*What I am, that is all that affects me. That
I am 28, or 8, or 58 years old is as nothing. Should
I mourn that the spring flowers are gone, that
the summer fruit has ripened, that the harvest is
reaped, that the snow has fallen ? Should I mourn
because so much addition has been made to the
^apital of human comfort?

In my study my fa^th is perfect. It breaks,
scatters, becomes compounded, in converse with

442 JOURNAL. [Ace *8,

men. Hume doubted in his study, and belieWd
in the world.

C

Mr. Robert Haskins .quoted a significant
proverb, That a woman could throw out with, a
spoon faster than* a man could throw in wifh a
shovel.

“ Always be sticking a tree, Jock,— it will be
growing when ye are sleeping,” was the thrifty
Scotchman’s dying advice. Always be setting a
good action to grow, is the advice of a divine
thrift. It i§ be^ri^g you fruit all the time, knit-
ting you to men’s hearts, and.to men’s good and
to God, and beyond this it is benefitting others
by remembrance, by emulation, by love. The
progress of moral nature is geometrical. Celes-
tial • economy !

Authors or Books quoted or referred to
IN Journals of 1831

Homer, //iW; Anaxagoras; Socrates; Plato,
Republic ; Aristotle, Poetica ;

Cicero, De Senecfute ; Horace; Plutarch; Plof
tinus ; Porphyry ; Thomas ii Kempij ; Luther ;
Montaigne; Calvin ;Sha[cspeare,^ff»«f’/r; Bacon;
Burton; Sir Thomas Browne; Milton; Jeremy

,1831] READING 443

TSylor; Herbert; Lovelace; Swammerdam;
Newton ;* Scougal ; Fenclon ; Young ; Sweden-

Abraham Tucker* (Edward Search); Samuel
J^ohnson ; Adafti Smith ; Burke ; Schlegel,G«ejjej
at TrutJb; Schiller; Wordswofth, Roh Roy^
Laodamia, Happy,JVarrior ; Mrs. Barbauld, 'The
Brook; Dugaid Stewart; Burns, To the Deil;
Kirby ; De Stael ; Schelling ; Scott ; Byron ;
Campbell, Pleasures ofiHope; Coleridge; Lan-
dor, Imaginary Conversations; Muller (Karl
Otfried, or Willjelm?); Webster; Everett.

JOURNAL XXiri

1832

From O (Blotting Book III) and Q
THE GOOD ^Ak
(From n)

<

Boston, January 4, 183a.

i

More is understood than is expressed in the
most diffuse discourse. It is the URsaid part of
every lect^rtf tha-t, does the most good. If my
poor Tuesday evening lecture? {horresco referents')
were to any auditor the total of his exposition
of Christianity, what a beggarly faith were it.

“.De.ath,” said you ? We die daily. “ Deathi”
— the soul never dies.

Theory of agreeable and disagreeable people,
alluded to by George Bradford,' that reflecting

1 George Partridge Bradford of Duxbury was, like his sister
Saral\ Aldcn, wife of Rev. Samuel Ripley of Waltham, through
life a close friend of Mr. Emerson. Mr. Bradford was affec-
tionate, refined, a born scholar and a lover oP flowers. He
prepared himself for the ministry,, but was so modest and sen-
sitive that he found himself unfitted for its public offices. He

445

.1832] PLAN FOR A BOOK

f

anQ self-improving minds ags not agreeable com-
pany, bufr tjiat indolent and deceitful, rather.

January 6.

Shall I not Vrite a book on topics such as
follbw? —

Chapter i. T|jat the mind is its own place;
Chapter Thaf exact justice is done;
Chapfe.r3. That good motives are at the
bottom of (many) bad actions; e. g. Business
before friends ;

Chapter 4*1 That the soul is immortal ;
Chapter .5. On prayers ;

^apter 6. That the best*is the true ;
Chapter 7. That the mind discerns all things;
Chapter 8. ’That the mind seeks itself in all
things.

' *Chapter 9. That truth is its own warAnt!

[Charles?] Sprague, [Rev. Mellishl.] Motte,
[Edward] Wigglesworth, [Charles H., later
Admiral?] Davis, [George P.] Bradford, [?]

Willis, [Rev. George] Ripley, [?] Henry,

•

^as a loyal member of the Brook Farm Community, and after
ita breaking up| became a teacher of classes of young ladies, an
occupation for which his cyliure and enthusiasm admirably
fitted him; also a devoted gardener.

446 JOURNAL [Ace 28

[Cornelius Conway^ Felton, [Rev. Fredericlti.] •
Hedge.*

[crystallization]

‘January 7.

There is a process in the mind very analogous
to crystallization m the mineral kingdom. I think
of a particular fact of singular, beauty and inter-
est. In thinking of it I am 'led to many more
thoughts which show themselves, first partially,
and afterwards more fully. But in the multifude
of them I see no order. When I would present
them to others they have no begiftning. There
is no metlipd. Lfcave them now, and return to
them again. Dodiesticate them in your mind,
do not force them into arrangement toe hastily,
and presently you shall find they will take their
own order. And the order they assume
vine, it is God’s architecture.

[excellence is truth]

January 9.

I cannot help quoting from Mendelssohn’s
Phado the following rule, “All that which, be-
ing admitted as true, would procure the human

I Very likely a list of the serious-minded^* and scholarly
young men who might meet for conversation or form a liter-
ary club.

183*] LAW BENEFICIAL 447

f

race a real advantage or a feeble consolation,
acqijires by that alone a high degree of proba-
Bijity.” When the skeptics;” says his Socr^tesj
“ object against the belief in God atfd virtue that
k is a simple political invention imagined for the
good of society, I reply, ‘ O, ’imagine a doctrine
as indispensable. to man, and I will pledge my-
self upoji its truth.’ ” This is a true account of
our instinctive faith. Why do I believe in a per-
fect system of comperftations, that exact justice
is done? Certainly not upon a narrow experi-
ence of a sdbre^or a hundred instances. For I
boldly affirm and believe the^nive^^ility of the
law.* But simplv that it is b?tter in the view of
the mind than any other way, therefore must be
the true way.* Whatever is better must be the
trjiec.way.

“ Little matters it to the simple lover of truth
to whom he owes such or such a reasoning.”

Mendelssohn.

Article “ Beauty ” in Ree’s Encyclopaedia
written by Flaxman, also “ Sculpture.”

Mem, R.ead Treatise on “Commerce” of
Lib. Useful Knowledge, and Mr. Lee’s “Ex-
position of E^vidence.”

448 JOURNAL [Age

DREAMS.

. Hideous dreamslast night, and queried to-day
whether they were any mor.e than exaggerations
of the sins of the day.* . . .

Regard (not) dreams, since they are but the
images of our hopes and fea'-s.”

Cato, apud Fielding’s Proverbs.

[ministerial bonds]

January lo.

It is the. best ^purt of the man, I. sometimes
think, that revolts most against his beipg a
minister. His good revolts from official go*od-
ness. If he never spoke or acted but with the
full consent of his understanding, if the whole
man acted always, how powerful would be every
act and every word. Well then, or ill then, how
much power he sacrifices by conforming himself
to say and do in other folks’ time instead of in
his own ! The difficulty is that we do not make
a world of our own, but fall into institutions
already made, and have to accommodate our<;
selves to them to be useful at al], and this

I Here followt a long pafagraph printed in "Spiritual
Lawt,” Essays I.

^3*] VIGOROUS ENGLISH 449

f

jaccommodation is, I say, a Ipss of so much in-
tegrity and», ()f course, of so much power.

^ut how shall the droning world get on if i\\
its beaux esprits recaloitrate upon it^ approved
fojms and accepted institutions, and quit them
all ifi order to be single mind&d? The double
refiners would produce at the other end the
double damned.

[native vigour in speech]

January 1 1 .

People sorrfttinjes wonder that persons wholly
uneducated to write, yet emineait in ^fame other
ability, should be able to use* language with so
mucfi purity and force. But it is not wonderful.
The manner of using language is surely the most
dec^si^ test of intellectual power, and he who
has intellectual force of any kind will be sure lo
show it there. For that is the first and simplest
vehicle of mind, is of all things next to the mind,
and the vigorous Saxon that uses it well is of the
same block as the vigorous Saxon that formed
it, and works after the same manner.

450 JOURNAL [Age

[true philosophy]

January' 11.

Diogenes was a true philosopher when he com-
pared his shade and his sunsnine to the alter-
nate residence ot* the Persian king at Susa and
Ecbatana. Men live, as it were, upon concen-
tric circles, a king upon a little larger arc, a
peasant upon a little less, but the most perfect
proportion subsisting between the enjoyments
and pains of one and of the other. Set your
habits right, as Paley said. Trifles will be occa-
sions of ■'pleasurd to a wise man, and of instruc-
tion. But nature must be exhausted to furnish
one hour’s stimulus to John Dart.

The good mind is set to happiness, the evil
to pain.

[power]

January io.

Don’t trust children with edge tools. Don’t
trust man, great God, with more power than he
has, until he has learned to use that little better.
What a hell should we make of the world* if
we could do what we would ! Pur a button on
the foil till the young fencers have learned not
to put each other’s eyes out.

.183*] BE YOUR BEST SELF 451

Is it not true that our power does increase
exactly in»tlje measure that we learn how to use

il*?^ *

** O Reason, Reason, art not thou he whom
Lseek?” Fenelon apud Cousin.

"January n.

Write on5)ersonal independence. There arc
men whose language is strong and defying
enojagh, yet their eyes and their actions aslc leave
of other men to live. A man considers the fash-
ion of his bAter, neighbour’s coat and hat, and
then^ condemns his own. Thf only.Way to im-
prove the fashion of his own* coat and hat is to
forget his neighbour and work out his own re-
sults; to eat less dinner ; to rise earlie*- ; to work
hardgj, do more benefits, and more strictly ad-
here in his acts to the decisions of his own judg-
ment. So to do will make his own coat and hat
very respectable in the eyes of all men. . . .

“ Say not then, ‘ This with that lace will do well ’ ;

But ‘ This with my discretion will be brave.* ”

Herbert.

What is the fault pfi Hotspur’s avowal? It
seems just.

452 JOURNAL [Acb z8

“ I ’ll give thrice so much land
To any well deserving friend ;

But in the way of bargain, mark ye me,

I ’ll cavil on the ninth part of a hair.” ‘

Be as beneficenf as the sun or the sea, b”.t if
your rights as a rational being are trenched on,
die on the first inch of your *errito.‘y. It requires
circumspection. Else he will be surprised by his
good nature into acquiescence in false'sentiments
uttered by others. Be a Cato, and it will be eas-
ier to keep out of sin and shame than in the ease
and social Ijabi^-of Maecenas.'

No mart gains ''redit for his cowardly courte-
sies. Every one makes allowance for so r.iuch
bowing and smiling and compliment as he sup-
poses was insincere, and rates the character so
much the worse for that heavy subtraction.

The true man of business never brags. He
talks simply of extensive commercial operations
that embrace years and nations in their comple-
tion. A country attorney has much more to say
about Washington and the Free Trade and Tar-
iff Conventions than the person whose influence
is felt in conventions.

I Htnry IF. Part I, iii, l.

»83*] NATURE'S KEYS— TRAVEL 453

DREAMS AND BEASTS

•j^hey] are two keys by which we are to fiMd
out the secrets of ou« own nature. All mystics
us£ them. The)f are like comparative anatomy.
They are test objects ; or we nfey say, that must
be a good theory
will brin^ a com
which explains these phenomena.*

TRAVEL

“ Here is He \%,ho gave away his lands to See
those of other men.” My friefid admires the
knccwjedge and tact of his feWow boarders who
have seen the world and know so much more of
men then he.* They got it however, not by peer-
ing^j^Jjput all over the. world, but by minding
their business. In the steadfast attention* to ^11
the detaijs of their profession, they met th*s in-
formation. Let the clergyman attend as stead-
fastly to his profession, and he will get as much
fact, as much commanding knowledge. Let him

trust God’s order, which supplies every eye which

•

I See Demonology in Lectures and Biographical
Sketcheff p. Centenary Ed.

z Probably Mr. Bradford, who enjoyed and valued travel,
all through life, as much u Mr, Emerson did little.

’.of the universe, that theory
manding claim to confidence

454 JOURNAL [Age t8

keeps its place with its fair share of opportunity,
as well as every mouth with its food.

My friend expects with travelling to learn
human nature, as if to become acquainted with
man it were necessary to know all the indivicju-
als upon earth. ‘Were it not wiser to let God
judge for us in this matter? He has provided
every man with twenty of thirty companions,
and two or three hundred acquaintances, by way
of specimen of the varieties of human character,
and as a large book wherein he may read his own
n^re in extenso.

Considcr\ls6 “^hat everybody’s occasions pro-
vide him with mdch variety of intercourse. He
is obliged to see the Statehouse, the college^ the
almshouse and jail, court, camp, ship, stable,
mine, and mountain sometime in his life, to travel
many* hundred miles by land and water. Keep
your eyes open, and God will provide you oppor-
tunity. Besides, if you go out to see tKe moon,
it will not please you ; but it will brighten and
cheer your walk of business. All goes to show

that, if you do your duty, wisdom will flow
« •

in. . . .

A SUBJECT

Write a sermon upon a house-hero, upon the
hero to his valet de chambre ; the ugly face that

rf32] LOW PHILOSOPHY — DUTY 455

I

obstinate association of true words and good acts
has made beautiful.

•‘JReal virtue is most loved where it is mo%t
nearly seen, and no respect which it tommands
from strangers c 3 n equal the never ceasing ad-
miration it excites in the daily intercourse of
domestic life.” Plutarch, Pericles.

The stinking philosophy of the utilitarian !
Nthil^ magnificuniy nihil generosum, sapity as Cicero
said of that of Epicurus.

Repose of mind we must ha# c, we,Jnust not
feel ^jwrhonistically/however may speculate.
What can comfort us if we think right and
wrong are idiosyhwasies ?

“ Outy subsists. Immutably survive
For our support the measures and the forms
Which afi abstract intelligence supplies
Whose kingdom is where time and space are not.”

January 27.

^alked with Reed and Worcester last evert-
ing about the^mutual influence of spirits.* Men-

I Rev. Thomas Worcester wis minister of the Sweden-
borgian Church in ^Boston for fifty years. He was a little

456 JOURNAL [Age zS

delssohn’s principke, that the desirable is the
true, is the best ' thing which can ,bc alleged in
favour of the position. God, we agreed, was
the communication between us and other spirits,
departed or present. Good wishes of us affect
them. What is this more than the stoical pre-
cept that “ the wise man who lifts his finger in
Rome affects all the wise men omthe earth.”

Indeed, their position is just equivalent, for
they suppose that spirit- affects spirit, uncon-

scious. Worcester said, God not so much sees
as dissolves us.

DR. CIIANNING pN WAR
(From Sk)

Boston, January 26, 1832.

Heard Dr. Channing last evening at thePeace
Society. Very good views. Freedom unfits for
war, unchains industry, and so makes property ;
then men are unwilling to put it at stake ; im-
proves men and gives them individuality, do not
follow leaders, etc. Only two men ever con-
trolled public opinion in this country, Washing-
ton and Jefferson. Efforts of the country in
the last war paralysed by the mino-ity, etc.

older than Emerson. He and Sampson Reed, author of Growth
of the Mind, which Mr. Emerson so valued, married sisters.

*»832] TO EACH HIS GIFT 457

January 30, 1832.

Every nfan hath his use, no doubt, and every-*
on\makes e ver the effort according to the energy
of his character to suit his external cftndition to
his inward constitution. If his external condi-
tion does not admit of such accommodation, he
breaks the form of* his life, and enters a new one
which does, ^f it \tTil admit of such accommo-
dation, he gradually bends it to his mind. Thus
Finijey can preach, and so his prayers are short;
Parkman can pray, and so his prayers are long ;
Lowell can visit, ^nd so his church Service *is
less. But what shall poor I dofwho ®fn neither
visil^nor pray nor^preach to m*y mind? Can yoil
not be virtuous? Can you not be temperate?
Can you not bfc charitable? Can yov- not be
chajtc^. Can you not be industrious ? Can you
not keep your word, and possibly when^ydu
have learned these things you may find the
others.

[The following letter, though not in the
Journal, seemed to the editors worth while to
insert here. It was written by Mr. Emerson
to a young cousin of his wife. Miss Elizabeth
Tucker (later, Mrs. JS 4 cGregor), of Derry,
N. H.]

45^ JOURNAL [Age zS

Boston, February i, 1831.

My dear CoWsin, — If it were ;iot true that
it is never too late to do right, I should be
quite ashafned to send m)’ list of books at such
a long distance behind my promise. When I
spent so pleasant a day at your house, I thought
it would be very easy and I , knew it would be
very pleasant for me to m‘ake out a scheme of
study for your vacation as soon as I, got home.
But what to select out of so great a company
of leather-jackets and so deserving — and then
a crowd “of things to be done — and withal a
Quaker habit o^ never doing things till their
necessary time, in the hopc.of doing them bet-
ter, has postponed my letter from day to day
and week to week. But so you must never do,
mv dear Cousin, But for fear you should quite
forget your wise adviser, and should be a grown
lady and so I should lose the honour of having
had any part in your education, I Iiasten to
send you my poor thoughts upon what is good
to be read. I make no pretensions to give you
a complete course, but only select a few good
books of my acquaintance — such as I thipk
you will like, and such as will seixe you.

One more prelimina’-y word ; Never mind any
silly people that try to sneer you out of the love

, 1832] LETTER ON READING 459

of* reading. People*are fast outgrowing the old^
prejudice^that a lady ought not to be acquainted
with* books. It is the display, that disgusts ; jche
knowledge that yoi^ get from thejn never dis-
gusts anybody^ but is all useful, and has com-
forted how many hours that would otherwise
have been long, ^du 11, and lonely.

First thegl*, yofu^iiust keep one or two books
for the ^^oul always by you for monitors and
angels, lest this world gf trifles should run away
with you. Such a book is Thomas a Kempis’s
Imitation of iCbrist, written by a Gerinan monk
near four hundred years ago^*.fnd*r\peds only a
littl’e allowance for.a Roman Gatholic’s opinions,
to^al^e*it express, the religious sentiment of
every good irfind- I'hen there is a little book I
value very much, Scqugal’s Life of (jod in the
'^oul of Man. Taylor’s Holy Dying is « good
book. Its author was called the ‘ Shakspfbar of
divines?

Selections from Fenelotty by Mrs. Follen.

W are. On the Formation of the Christian Char-
acter.

Sir Thomas Browne’s Religion of a Physidan ;
this is a be^autiful work lately republished in this
town.

y oung’s Night Thoughts. A friend whom I

460 JOURNAL. [Age 28

value very much told Ehen always to keep
Young upon her tafile.

But I suppose you will think here are Sun-
day books enough. Now^ for History. 1 he
‘American Society for the Diffusion of Useful
Knowledge ’ are publishing Muller’s Universal
History in four duodecimo volumes. It is very
much the best of all the general histories, and is
very easily read. They have only printed the first
volume. The sketch of Rome and of Greece in

t

it are {sic) excellent. Then the most important
modern history to be read perhaps is Robertson’s
Charles whicl. is an account of Europe in the
nv>st interesting period. I would skip the^ first
volume, which is a general View of Evrrppe, ».nd
read the two last. Then youmight^takeup Hume,
say at the reign of Elizabeth, which would con-
tinue pretty well the line of events. The ocst
history of Europe during the French Revolu-
tion is Scott’s Life of Napoleon. For the Ameri-
can history, as you happen to live at Derry,
N. H., I would read Dr. Belknap’s History of
the State. It is not only a very good book
itself, but will give you a pretty good idea of
all the States, — their story is so much alike.

O ,

Morton’s New England! s Memorial is a little
book and a pleasing account of the Forefathers.

|832] letter on reading 461

Milman’s History'of the Jews in the Family
Library is »a very good book. •

•Bu’t what is far more soothing, and never pain-
ful like the history of plan, is Naturab History in
its^ various parts.^ The first Volume of the Ameri-
can Library of Useful Knowledge (and you must
make the Social , Library of Derry subscribe
for that boo^) corfcains Mr. Brougham' s Dis-
course Upon the Advantages and Prospects of
Science, which is excelle,nt, and Mr. HerscheT s,
which is better. The same Mr. Herschel, son
of the famous astronomer, is about to publish a
Discourse on. Astronomy, which^is exjg^cted with
great ’^interest. Th^n there is a beautiful book
on Am^rifean Birds, ,the Ornithology by Mr.
N uttall, that eV«ry one who lives in the country
ought to read.

'i suppose you have read School Conversatims
on Chemistry. ’The Conversations on Vegetable
Physiolo^ are just as good. With this class of
books is the Account of Polar Expeditions, a vol-
ume of the Family Library.

I suppose to such a formidable list 1 must
a(Jd a novel or two, or you would think me vdry
unkind. SoJ really hope you will read DeVere
by the author of Tremainp, and as much of Wal-
ter Scott and Miss Edgeworth as you please.

462 JOURNALf [Age 2S

For poetry read Mdton. If the Paradise Lost
tires you, it is so stately, try the Minor Poems.

~ Comus, if the mythology does not make it sound
strange, is ar beautiful poem and makes one holy
to read it. Read Bryant’s Poems ; I know ypu
will love them, and Cowper and Thomson^ and
perhaps (a very large perhaps) Wordsworth. If
you do not like poetry, which 1, suppose you
do, the best way to learn is to write some.

Now I do not suppose that you will read all
these books in a short time, or perhaps at any
tithe, and*some of them very probably you have
read. I only wanted to fulfil your command and
speak a good wora for some valued acquaintance
of mine. The best of ali ways to marke one’s
reading valuable is to write •about it, and so I
hope my Cousin Elizabeth has a blank-book
where* she keeps some record of her thoughts.

And if you think my letter very long, why you
must bear in mind that once I was a school-
master, and I am so proud of my new scholar
as to keep her long at my lecture.

Make my respectful remembrances to your
mother and father, and my compliments to yonr
sister.

Your affectiopate Cousin,

R, W. Emerson.

1832] RICHES OF WISE MAN 463 ,

POVERTY AND ’riches

February 6

%

Every man has some facts in his inind which
invalidate the common sayings, and incline him
to tTiink that the poor are as nappy as the rich.
The man, not the condition, imports. There
are many rich who’would be happy if they were
poor; m^y poor who would be unhappy if
they were rich. A poem would give me more
pleasure than a hundred dollars, and mind
does so far Vindicate itself that I think the
man^does not live so base wb^ would exchange
the. least intellectual power for the wealth of
the world. I believe' a hundred dollars a year
would support *mte in the enjoyment of what I
loy^bfst. Why toil I .then for twenty times as
much? Might I cut and run? Might I'dighi-
fiedly walk away, and keep the man nor turn
cat? . . .

Take nothing for granted. That strikes you
in hearing the discourse of a wise man, that he
has brought to the crucible and the analysis’ all
that other people receive without question, as
chemists are directed jto select what manufact-
urers throw ayfay.

^ 464 JOURNAL [Aoe *,8*

The words of wise men are heard in quiet more •
. than the cry of him that ruleth among fools.

Ecclesiasticus ix, 17^.

Consider the permanence of the best opinion ;
the certainty with which a good book acquires
fame, though a bad book succeeds better at first.
Consider the natural academy which the best
heads of the time constitute, and which, ’t is
pleasant to see, act almost as harmoniously, and
efficiently, as if they were organized and acted
by’ vote. * ,

Men af^preciatG instinctively the measure of
a‘ superior intellect ; as if a part of the msn ac-
knowledged the messiahship of wisdom, whilst
a part denied it, — an awkw^ard consciousness
that here is merit, here is power, though latent
and wholly inapplicable to my wants and state of
mind. I should say it is the Newton within the
peasant that recognizes N ewton as the ornament
of the human race. I met some good sentences,
in Brewster’s Life of Newton^ from Leonardo
da Vinci. I of course take the spiritual sense
of the passage. “In the study of the sciences
which depend on mathematics, those who do
not consult nature, but aiuthors, are not the
children of nature, they are only her grand-

• 183*] BOOK AND READER 465

cfiildren. Nature alone is the master of true
genius.” » .

* ^Adhere to nature, never to accepted opinior.r.
The sermon which '- 1 write inquisitive of truth

good a year after, but that which is written
because a sermon must be writ is musty the
next day. . . .

February 18, 1832.

Whatman we see, read, acquire, but ourselves.
Cqusin is a thousand -books to a thousand per-
sons. Take the book, my friend, and read your
eyes out, you wtill never find there what I rind.
If I would have a monopo^r’of tjie delight or
tl^nvisdom I get,* I am as secure now the book
is English as if it were imprisoned in Syriac.*
Judge of the vise different persons can make of
^tjjis ^ook by the use you are able to make of it
at different times ; sometimes very imperfectly
apprehending the author and very little inter-
ested ; again delighting in a sentence or an argu-
ment; another time, ascending to the compre-
hension of the whole reasoning, but implicitly
following him as a disciple ; at another, not only
•understanding his reasoning, but understanding
his mind;* able not only to discern, but to pre-

1 The substance of the Jait sentences occurs in " Spiritual
Laws,” Essays /.

^4^6 JOURNAL' [Age 28

diet his path and its,relation to other paths, to
discern his truth ahd his error.* . . «

NOTHING IS NEW

m

February 19.

Was,not all trufh always in the world ? Even
the Lord’s Prayer, Grotius represents as a com-
pilation of Jewish petitions, "and the German
commentators trace almost all the precepts of
Christ to Hebrew proverbs. And I learn to-day
that the Copernican system, — it is gathered
frorti the writings of Aristotle, — wis maintained
by some phikppher(i before his [Aristotle's) time.
(Library Useful Rnowledgey Life of Galileo.)
And the new light, brand ni^w, of the Sweden-
borgians even, is old as thought, '-i match every
saying of theirs with some Greek or Latin pro-
verb, e.'g., “the wise man lifting his finger,” etc.

GALILEO

February 20, 1832.

One is tempted to write a lecture on the right
use of the senses, from having attention called to
the fact that Galileo lost his sight in 1 636. “ Th&.
noblest eye is darkened,” said Castelli, “ which

I Here follows in this journal ^the passage, ** Introduce a
base person among gentlemen,*^ etc. in Spiritual Laws/^

4832] OLD QUESTIONS — SIN 467

nature ever made, an eye so jyivileged, and gifted
with such,r§ire qualities, that ’it may with truth
be said to have seen more than all of those w 4 io»
are gone, and to hava opened the eyes of all who
arf to come.” See also the expressions of Gali-
leo himself, quoted p. 75, Life of Galiko, in
Library Useful JCnowledge. Galileo died in
1642, a:t. 78**

So the^ye of Milton.

.It is idle in us to wonder at the bigotry and
violence of the persecution of Galileo. Every
man may read thf history of it in himself when
he is contradicted and silencejjl in alignment by
a pgrcon whom he •had always reckoned his in-
ferior.

[unanswered questions!

_ wrote one day, after being puzzled by. a nje-
chanical alderman, that the first questions r®main
to be asked. ’T is even so ; and many a profound
genius, I suppose, who fills the world with fame
of his exploding renowned errors, is yet every
day posed by trivial questions at his own supper-
table.

[sin]

It is not permitted fo do wrong in the dark.
Set out to sin^^and the whole cause will have a

468 JOURNAL [Age

hearing, however Ijrief ancl mad you be. The
best arguments arfc yet stated by th^ opposition.
,T^e angels are faithful to their post as the
devils.

' [from q]

Chardon ?'^REEr, Boston.

March iq,''i83a.

Temperance is an estate. I am richer, the s.tolc
might say, by my self-command than I am by
my'incomc. And literally, for, his 'acquaintance
spends at fthe cont^ctioner’s what pays the book-
seller’s bill of the 'Stoic and makes himvtich
indeed. Then the sum withholden from the
liquor-dealer enables the Stoic to' be magnificent
in expenses of charity and of taste. To sjiy.qo-
thiftg of the doctor’s and apothecary’s accounts.

A good way to look at the matter is to see
how it figures in the ledger. Bacon says. Best
spent in the most permanent ways, such as buy-
ing plate. This year I have spent say J20 in wine
and liquors which are drunk up, and the drink-
ers kre the worse. It would have bought a beauf.
tiful print that would have pleased fosa century;
or have paid a debt. .

But every indulgence weakened ^hc moral fac-

.1832] DISSATISFACTION 469

ulty, hurt at least for the tigie the intellect, low-
ered the ijian in the estimation of the spectators
though sharers, injured them, and diminished
the means of beneficence.

TU.CURA T131

March 14, 183 a.

AnythingVot^base is desirable to bring about
so goocTan end as this of personal purity. Be
master of yourself, and*for the love of God keep
every inch you gain. No man who has once by
hatred of exCess^astered his appetites would be
bought back to his bondage fey any^possessions.

2? March, my foo^^^r weighed 14 ^ oz.
29 • f 13

2 A^ril, “ « « « “ 12 14 “

[dissatisfaction]

Whalt ails you, gentlemen ? said Jupiter. What
ails you, my wo-begone friend ? Speak, what
are you? “Bilious.” And you? “A slave.”
And you? “Hypp’d.” And you? “Poor.” And
^ou? “Lame.” And you? “A Jew.”

March 29.

I visited Ellen's tomb and opened the coffin.

470

JOURNAL

[Age 28 ,
March 30;

I am your debtor. Sir James Maolcintosh, for
•^'our Ethics, and yet, masterly book as it is, highly
as I esteem 'the first account of the Conscience
that has ever been given, yefic is it at la^it
only an outline, nor can suffice to my full satis-
faction. . . .

Omnis Aristippum docuit color et status ejt res.

Horace. ,

C<

‘‘ Be not almighty, let me say,

Against, but for me/* ^

Herbert.

'An ingenious an'd pleasing> account of hiwpan
nature is Hartley’s successive passionsr as ex-
pounded by Mackintosh. Each'btcomes the par-
ent of a new and higher passion, and itself dip^
If the 'Scheme of Necessity must be admitted,
then let that doctrine also be the antidote, the
gradual glorification of man. . . . Very costly
scaffoldings are pulled down when the more
costly building is finished. And God has his scaf-
foldings. Thejewish Law answered its temporary
purjjose and was then set aside. Christianity is
completing its purpose as an aid ,to educate
man. And evil is a scaffolding on which univer-
sal good is reared. God shall be all in all. . . .

1832] TO EACH HIS OWN 471
«

MOORE TO CRAB6E OF CAMPBELL

“ True b'ard ! and simple, as the race
Of heaven- born poets ever are,

When,, stooping frdm their starry pRce,

They 're* children, near, though gods afar.”

j^uuM cuique]

The WO rtS is^ an academy to the scholar, a
butt to the satirist, a church to the devotee, “ the
sealFold of the divine vengeance ” to the Calvin-
ist, good society to the fashionist, a market to
the merchant, a,conquest to Ajexander.

‘‘No one cai\ gbess what'kind of vision Be-
longs tb the fly. T«kere are probably 25,000 hex-
agonal lenses or 'Menisci on its surface, or the same
plumber of distinct visual organs, as some com-
parative anatomists would lead us to believe.”

Abernethy, Lectures.

“deus anima brutorum ”

April 2.

Write a sermon upon animals. They are to
♦nan in life what fables about them are in ethics.
Draw the moral then of the bee, ant, fox, hedge-
hog, ermine, swine, toc, woodpecker, pigeon,
worm, moth,. mite, a frozen snake.

472 JOURNAL' [AoEiS*

[memoranda for] sermon on idleness

■- “In the sweat of thy face thou shalt eat bread.”
Galileo’s eye. He that doas nothing is poorer
than he that has nothing. “ The devil tempos
others; an idle mafi tempts the devil.” “ An idle
brain is the devil’s shop.” “ I^e hath no leisure
who useth it not.” The busy man V. entirely ig-
norant of what was doing this morning all ov?r
the city. Working in ycur calling is half pray-
ing. What keeps the world from being a horrid
Poiieropolis? What divides and conquers? Ne-
cessity of a’l ; Labor ; “ Poverty is a good which
all hate.” Give u:? no leisure until we aue fit
for it.

[the force within]

1 . Blundering rhetorician seeking in the
tones or gestures of Chatham or Adams, or in
the circumstances of the parties present or con-
cerned, the electricity that lay only in the breast
of Chatham and Adams ; — Pectus est disertum
et vis mentis.'

I Probably a fragment from Quintus Fabius Pictor, the

Father of Latin History/^ who lived in the time of the
Third Punic War, and is quoted with respect by Cicero and
Livy.

PERSIAN SCULPTURES 473

[nature’s tea^ihing]

April 6, 1832. '

I* was the comparing the mechanism of the
hand and the foot th^t led Galen, wKo, they say,
wSs ji skeptic in his youth, to tjie public declara-
tion of his opinion that intelligence mustTiave
operated in ojdai|lijig the laws by which living
beings ar^ constructed.

In explaining these things,” he says, “ I es-
teem myself as composiftg a solemn hymn to the
great architecjt of our bodily frame, in which I
think there is mor/e true piety ^jvin^n Sacrificing
hecatombs"of oxen or burnii^ the tfiost costly
peribmes, for I firs’t endeavour from his worlcs
to know him n\yself^nd afterwards by the same
means to show h*im to others, to inform them
how gceat is his wisdom, his goodness, his
Power.” Galen, apud Abernethy, Lectures.

Hunter like Pestalozzi ; each lived to an idea
which was their guide and genius; but Aber-
nethy is hardly a Niederer. So Jussieu wrote
nothing, yet had an idea.

[PERSIAN scriptures]

April 17.

A strange poem is Zoroastrism. It is a system
as separate anc^ harmonious and sublime as Swed-

474 JOURNAL [Age *8.

enborgianism — coijgruent! One would be glad
. to behold the truth which they all sljadow forth.
*?cff it cannot but 'be truth that they typify and
symbolize, as the play of every faculty reveals
an use, a cause and a law to the intelligent. Ope
sees h: this, and in them all, the element of^ po-
etry according to Jeffrey’s tru* theory, the effect
produced by making every tlimg ofitward only a
sign of something inward : Plato’s forms or ideas
which seem almost tantamount to the Ferouer's of
Zoroaster. “ Of all the Ferouers of beings that
should exlst^in^the world, the.mo^t precious in
the eyes c>f,Ormuzd were that of Law, that of
I fan and that of Zoroaster,” Acad'emie doe , In'
scriptions, vol. 37, p. 623 r But what I would
have quoted just now to illiKtlate the poetry
theory is this : — .

Fire, the sun of Ormuzd, was also created.
He represented, though imperfectly, the origi-
nal fire which animates all beings, forms the
relations which exist between them and which in
the beginning was a principle of union between
Ormuzd and lixmt-sans-bornes ” (which is the
first name in their Theodicaea). t

By the way, I cannot help putting in here an
exquisite specimen of the vraisemblance in fiction.
Among the evil persons and things produced by

.ZOROASTER

1832]

475

. Ahriman, it is said, ~ Ahr 'ynan produisit mime
une espice di^J'eu t'en'ebreuXy dorit vient celui de U
fievre^ — p. 628.

Do we npt feel in reading these elemental theo-
ri^ that these gtt)tesque fictions are the gallipots
of Socrates, that these primeVal allegouea are
globes and diagranjs on which the laws of living
nature are ejiJ)laifi^ ? Do we not seem nearer
to divin^truth in these fictions than in less
pretending prose ?

Here is one of the sentences. Goschoroon

prosptct of the
saiS^to heaven
in the* beginning when there ^as no night, thft
there mwst be put^-y of thought, of word and
of action,” — p*.* bqj.

^ I^am^quoting from the Histoire de Y Acad'emie
des Inscriptions y vol. 37.

Prometheus archaic: “Jupiter an upstart.”

rejoicing befoTe Qrmuzd at the
creation of^Zoroaster, says, “jT

The foolish took no oil in their vessels with
their lamps. Pestalozzi said, “ that no man was
either willing or able to help any other man.”

Chardon St., April 29, 1832.

You may chuse for yourself, or let others chuse
for you, in things indifferent. You may give the

476 JOURNAL [Agb a8

law, or take it. Uet a man set down his foot
and say, “this or that thing I ca^i’t and won’t
do,” and stand it out, it shall be counted to him
not only for innocency, but for righteousness ;
* whilst a poor craven stands by, omitting the
sam?. thing and apologizing for it, and receives
the hearty contempt and r/jund abuse of all
observers.

You had better begin small, sail in an eggshell,
make a straw your mast, a cobweb all your cloth.
Begin and proceed on a settled and not-to-be-
shaken conviction that but litjtle is permitted to
any man tp do 05 to know, and if lie complies
v.'ith the first grand laws, he shall do well.. He
had better stick by what h^, knows sart-ain^ that
humility and love are always to be practised; but
there is no such pressing reason for his assert-
ing his opinions, but he had better be humble
and kind and useful to-day and to-morrow and
as long as he lasts. Count from yourself in
order the persons that have near relation to you
up to ten or fifteen, and see if you can consider
your whole relation to each without squirming.
That will be something. Then, have you pa’d
all your debts ? Then, have you paid to the world
as much kindness as you received from early
benefactors Pit were a sort of b^eness to die in

1832] EXPRESSION — SERMONS 477

the world’s debt. Tlien, cay you not, merely for
the very cjl^gancy, the erudittis lums of the thing,
do an unmixed kindness or two?

EXPRESSION

3.

Sir J. Mackintosh said well, that every pic-

t 1# * *

ture, statue*and poem was an experiment upon
the human mind. I hvuit in Charles’s dish of
shells each new form o£ beauty and new tint, and
seem, as Fontenelle said, “ to recognize the thing
the first tim^I s^e it.” Every knot of every cotkle
has expression, that is, is theipiateri^ symbol of
sqmfe cast off thought.

SERMONS

,To, analyse a foolish sermon may require
much wisdom. Strange that so learned arid gifted
a man as my frjpnd should please himself with
drawing for an hour such gingerbread distinc-
tions.

May 7.

Charles says that Porto Rico is a place where
one is newer pestered with cold feet and never
needs a pocket-handjcerchief, and never is un-
willing to gej out of bed in the morning.

478

JOURNAL

[Age 28

[a thought .uWder another name]

^utato nomine^ de tefabula narratur.

To be at perfect agreement with a man of most
opposite conclusions you have only to translate
your language Into his. The same thought which
you call God'm his nomenclature is called Christ.
In the language of William Ptnn, moral senti-
ment is called Christ.

May 1 1 .

There is no country so extensive as a thought.
“He who contemplates hath a Jay without
night.” ' ‘

, I^SYMBOLS]

I suppose an entire cabi»^(?t of shells, would
be an expression of the wholevhaman mind; a
Flora of the whole globe would be so likewise ;
or a history of beasts; or a painting of all the
aspects of the clouds. Everything is significant.

[be master]

. . . Reduce the body to the soul. Make
the body the instrument through which that
thought is uttered. It is counted disgraceful it^
the ambassador not to represent in the dignity
of his carriage the power. of his country. If your
manners are false to your theory, cut them off.

.1832] MASTERY — WOMEN 479

as* Cranmer burnt Ithe offending hand. Don’t
shrink from your work. If will ‘never be an
exarfiple further than it should be : for no ofch^
man has the same freak. Do not. believe that
possibly you can escape the reward of your ac-
tiofl. You serve an •ungrateful master, —.-serve
him the more. wholly his. Embrace any ser-
vice, do what ycfti.*will, and the master of your
master, t^e Law of laws, will secure your com-
pensation. . . .

He that rides his hobby gently nvist always
give way to him that rides 1^5 nobby hard.

*ls ifnot better tp intimate our astonishment
as we pass through the world, if it be only for
a moment ere we are .swallowed up in the yest
of^ the abyss ? I will just lift my hands and say,

KOO’/XOS !

[woman]

May 12.

Burns’s remark about fine women too true
in my experience. Is not affluence, — or at least
gasy circumstances, — essential to the finish of
the female, character? Not to its depth and
resources,’ perhaps, but to the beauty of mind
and manners. Is it not because woman is not

480 JOURNAL [Age 28

yet treated properly, but some taint of Indian
barbarity marks yet our civilization? She was
made, not to serve, but to be served, and only
wealth admits among us of that condition. Or
is it that an eye to interest is a fatal blot to the
femal? character, and the poor scarce can help it?

Write a sermon upon ^Bless^d Poverty.
Who have done all the good in th^ world?
Poor men. “Poverty is a good hated by all
men ! ”

SPANISH PROVERBS

God comes to see us without a bell.

A wall between both, best preserves /riend-
ship. 1 '

Whither goest thou. Grief? Where I am
used to go.

Make the night night, and the day day.

Working in your calling is half praying.

When you are all agreed upon the time,
quoth the curate, I will make it rain.

He counts very unskilfully who leaves God
out bf his reckoning.*

I Brahma, in Emerson’s poem, says: “ They reckon ill
who leave me out.”

183*] TRUJH— THOUGHT 481

A good man is erer at home wherever he

chance tq be.*

• •

[truth coming]

“Truth, never is; always is a-beihg.” Does
nol that word signify that state in which a man
ever finds himself conscious of knowing nocffing,
but being just noin^-^ady to begin to know ? He
feels like one*just hTorn. He is ready to ask the
first questions.

Sttange how abysmal is our ignorance. Every
man who writes a book or pursues a science
seems to conceaUambitiously his lyiifersal ig-
norance under this fluency in m. partvtilar.

'l^i^ higher the Subjects are, which occupy
your thcTughts, the «j3iore they tax yourself; and
the same thougfiti have least to do with your
iadi^iduality, but have equal interest for all
men. Things moreover are permanent in j)ro-
portion tp their inwardness in your nature.

SHAKSPEARE

May 16, 1832.

Shakspeare’s creations indicate no sort of anx-
iety to be understood. There is the Cleopatra,

I “ Go where he will, th^ wise man is at home.”

Poem, “ Woodnotes.”

482 JOURNAL [Age 28

an irregular, unfinished, glorious, sinful char-
acter, sink or swim, there she is, and not one
ip, the thousand of his readers apprehends the
noble dimensions of the heroine. Then n.riel,
Hamlet, and all; all done ip sport with the
free, daring pencil of a master of the World.
He leaves his children with God.

It is a good sign in hu^an diature, the un-
mixed delight with which we contemplate the
genius of Shakspeare, and if it were ten times
more, should be glad.

[know, to LIis.e]

May 1 7.

King James liked old friends best; a., he
said, his old shoes were easVest to his feet. We
are benefitted by coming to an understanding,
as it is called, with our fellow men, ttnd with
any fellow man. It empties all the ill blood; it
ventilates, purifies the whole Constitution. And
we always feel easiest in the company of a
person to whom the whole nature has been so
made known. No matter what, but how well
known.

[new lights]

The moment you present a man with a new
idea, he immediately throws its light back upon

ENVY

1832]

483

the mass of his thoughts, to see what new rela*
tion it %will discover. And thus all our know-
ledge is a’perpetually living capital, whose ^use
caiwiot be exhausted, as it revives with every
new fact.* The^e is proof for noblest truths in
w*htt we already k;now, but, we have not yet
drawn the distinction which shall methodize our
experience ii^ a particular combination.

ENVY

* May 18.

Shall I nQt write upon Envy ? upon the jvis-
dom of Christ ^hich ranks e«/y with robbery,
whic]i is only envy in act?*upon 1:^e folly ^of
eifC-y, which see 4 cs an impossible thing, viz., to
draw another *,n^a1i’s good to itself? — In the
sweat of thy browshalt thou eat bread. — Upon
thb ncfbleness which converts all the happiness
of the world into my happiness, and makes Mr.
Davis’s* house Agreeable to me? Pestalozzi’s
melancholy paradox, that no man is able or will-
ing to help any other man, should set men right.
Who receive hospitality ? the hospitable ; who
receive money ? the rich. Who receive wisdom ?
the wise. To whom do opportunities fall ? to
the opportune. Unto him that hath shall be
given.

484 JOURNAL , [Age 28

• Malthus coops up indomitable millions ; spir-
itual world not so/ We rejoice unmi^'.edly in
Shakspeare’s geniu.s. Ardour with which wc de-
sire a friendj^.a teacher oi prima pbilosophia. Ad-
miration warms and exalts. Thjp loveV is made
happier by his love than th^ object of his afTec-
tion.

f

" No revenge is more herclcjthan that which
torments envy by doing good.” Would you be
revenged ? Live well. .. •

Who hath envy ? I do not envy any one, in
the .sense of wishing their goods mine. But I
am capable^. I‘ may easily see, of malevolence to
th<}se who have in^mred me, or before whom I
have played the fool. Charles saith. The Jack- ''
son Party hath envy, and dou'o|:l?ss the low idle
hate the high rich. It is a very low passion, if
we have to look so hard to find it. It is &s rare *
as robbery, its bad son.

[constancy]

May 19.

How has the soldier acquired his formidable
couftge? By a rare occasional action, effort?,
No ; by eating his daily bread in dapger of his
life, by having seen a tho^usand times what reso-
lution and combination can accomplish.

1832] PR^SflNT AND PAST 485

• Well; is any other virtue to be gained in an^
other v^y? How is a firm, cheerful conversa-
tion* to bVgot? Not by one effort, but* by
spending days and ears well, and, so having a
divine sApporr^ for such a frail nature to lean
upftn. A divine support of all the virtue x>f his
life. The bubblp of the Present is every mo-
ment hardeping.iiyto the flint of the Past.

• What makes the m^'esty of Brougham, and
Webster and Mackintosh? No brass resembles
gold. The consciousness of an ini^ocent life,
and the cjimulative glory of sfo mftnjr witnesses
behipd.' ... ,

• CONCEALMENT

If you would jnbt be known to do anything,
— never do it.* ....

THE PRESENT

The vanishing, volatile froth of the Present
which any shadow will alter, any thought blow

1 The journal here gives essentially the passage in Self
Reliance*’ (p. 59, Century Ed.), with •♦the heroes of
the senate and field ’* instead of the names here given ; ajid, a
few lines later, instead of •• the thunder of Chatham’s voice,”
the original haa music of Channing’s voice.”

2 Here follows a passage differing but slightly from that in
^•Spiritual Laws” beginning wdth the same words.

486 JOURNAL , [Ace 28

away, any event annihilat6, is every ‘moment
converted info the Adamantine Record' of the
Past, — the fragility of the man into the Eter-
nity of God The Present, is always becom’ing
the Past. We walk on molten^rlava bn which

I

the claw of a fly etc the fall « of a hair make? its
impression, which being received, the mass hard-
ens to flint and retains evdty infpression for-
evermore.

THE POINT, OF VIEW

i

There is a great -parallax in human nature
ascertained by observing it from di'flerent states
of mind. .‘ t . . «

‘ JORTIN ■ , ' ,

Jortin said in his tracts tha'ii: they who uphold
the orthodox doctrine of the Trinity must be
prepared to assert “ that Jesus Christ is Kis own'
Father and his own Son. The consequence will
be so, whether they like it, or whether they like
it not.” He also said in a letter to Gilbert Wake-
field, “ There are propositions contained in our
liturgy and articles which no man of common
sense among us believes.” *

I John Jortin, D. D. ( 1698-1770), author of Dhetunes
concerning the Truth of the Christian Religion and Life of
Erasmus.

1832] THE. ONE MIRACLE 487

[missionary -work]

“»You*sfend out to the Sandwich Islands one

# #

missionary and twenty-five refutations in the crew
of the vessel,” said Mr. Sturgis.

[the miracle of the UNIVERSfi]

t

Indeed Usrulih stranger than fiction. For what
has imagination created to compare with the sci-
ence of astronomy? What is there in Paradise
Lo*st to elevate and astonish like Herschel or
Somerville ?• The contrast between fhe magni-
tude and .duration of the thin^ obfe^Fed and the
aninjalcule observ^er! It seems a rnere eye sjiil-
’ irf^ abput space in an egg-shell, and for him to
undertake to'jv^i^h the formidable masses, to
measure the secular periods, and settle the theory
of thifigs so vast and long, and out of the little
cock-boat of a planet to aim an impa*tinent
telescope at efery nebula and pry into the
plan and state of every white spec that shines
in the inconceivable depths ! Not a white spot
but is a lump of suns, — the roe, the milt
jof light and life. Who can be a Calvinist, or
who an ath^eist ? God has opened this knowledge
to us to correct our Rheology and educate the
mind.

488 JOURNAL [Age 28

“How many centuries of observations were
necessary to render the earth suspected/ ”

Am. Encyciopcedki.

r

" A good 'naturalist cannOt be a bad man."

Bewick,.

Bonus oratory bonus vir.

So Galen, so Abernethy, sb Daty.

Has not some astronomer said Youilg’s sen-
timent of astronomy ?

I hope the time will come when there will be
a telescope, in every street.*

DESIGN

Every form is a history of the thing. The corti-
parative anatomist can tell aC .sight whether a
skeleton belonged to a carnivorous or herbivor-
ous, animal, a climber, a jumper, a run*her,"a ’
digger^ a builder. The conchologist can tell at
sight whether the shell covered' an animal that
fed on animals or on vegetables, whether it were

I Stars haunt us with their mystery,'' wrote Mr. Emer-
son in The World Soul," and the spectacle of the heavens
at night always stirred him; see the opening passage of
** Nature." The great astronomers interested him; see the*
passage in The Method of Nature" about che stars and
star-gazers : also the early verses/^ The Poet," in the Appen-
dix to Poems.

.1832] .ASTRONOMY 489

a river or a sea ^heH, whether it dwelt in still;
or in turbid waters. Every tfiing is ‘a monster till
we bnow what it is for, a ship, .a telescope, a s^rg-
ica> instrument, arejjuzzles and painful to t^e
eye until ^e have been shown successively the use
of Overy part, and ^en the fjiing tells its story
at sight and is beautiful. A lobster is monstrous,

but when weJhaveJbeen shown the reason of the

• •

case and~,4he colour and the tentacula and the
proportion of the claws, and seen that he has not
a s<?ale nor a bristle nor any quality but fits to
some habit afid condition of the creature, he ^hen
seems as p?rfecfand suitable to hi» sea-house as
a glqy^e to a hand. man in {he rodcs under the
sdi* would be a monster, but a lobster is a most
handy and hagp^^fellow there.

ASTRONOMY

May* 26.

Astrbnomy h?th excellent uses. The first ques-
tions it suggests, how pregnant ! Do you believe
that there is boundless space ? Just dwell on that
gigantic thought. Does not idealism seem more
jprobable than a space upon whose area what is,
the family of being, is a mere dot, and the thought
of men or angels can n^ver fathom more than its
verge ? All is lost in tire bosom of its great night.

490 JOURNAL [Age 29

Next see how it corrects the vaunty specu-
lations of men. It was an old sarcasm. If the
triangles had a god, they would paint him»with
three sides. And men take rnan, of course, foi* the
type of the highest beings, and syppose whatever
is intelligent and great must be like hinl in
nature. Astronomy gives the lie to all this, and
shows that whatever beings inha bit>Saturn, Jupi-
ter, Herschel, Venus, even in this little neigh-
bourhood of social worlds that so nearly resem-
ble ours, must be of entirely different structure
from man. .The human race could not breathe in
the moon,, nor exist in the cold of Saturn, nor
move in the' gravitx- of Jupiter.

Well then, it irresistibly modifies all theology.

' v»

f- C.

“ Not to earth’s contracted span
Thy goodness let m‘e bound.

Nor think thee. Lord, alone of man
When thousand worlds ar^ round.”

Calvinism suited Ptolemaism. The irresist-
ible effect of Copernican Astronomy has been to
make the great scheme for the Salvation of man
absolutely incredible. Hence great geniuses who
studied the mechanism of the heavens became
unbelievers in the popular faith. Newton became
a Unitarian, Laplace, in a Catholic country, be-

491

'1832] CRISIS IN LIFE

came an infideh sujistituting necessity for GotJ;
but a i^lf-intelligent neces'feity is .God.

Thus • dstronomy proves theism, but dis-
pioves dogmatic theology. The Sermon on fhe
Mountfmust be true throughout all the space
^hich the eye sees^and the,brain imagines, but
St. Paul’s epistles, the Jewish Christiartity would
be unintelligibj,e.» It operates steadily to estab-
lish the«4noral laws, to disconcert and evaporate
•temporary systems. At the touch of time errors
scatter, in the eye of Eternity, truth prevails.

[the crisis]

Jvjft iy 1832.

' dold, cold.. Thermometer says temperate.
Yet a* week pf riVoral excitement.*

Is it years add nations that guide my pen ?

I Iiave sometime^ thought that, in-order to
be a good minister, it was necessary to |eave the
ministry. The*profession is antiquated. In an

I This must have been the week in which Mr. Emerson
made known to his people his repugnance to the Communion
rite, and proposed its modification, at least to one of Com-
memoration simply, omitting the use of the elements. The
matter was referred to a Committee for consideration,* Mean-
while the yjung minister, following the example of Jesus in
all periods of trial and distrws, withdrew to the mountains for
spiritual renewal.

492 JOURNAL [Age 29

akered age, we worship in thf de^d forms of oqr
forefathers. Were not a Socratic pa^nism better
than an effete, superannuated Christianity ?„
'Does not every shade of thought have its
own tone, so that wooden voices denote^ wooden
minds? . < '

Whatever there is of Authority in religion is
that which the mind does not^a^im^te.

» I

Conway, N. H., ^uly 6.
Here, among the movfntains, the pinions lof
thought should be strong, and one should see
the errors df fnen^froma calmer height of love
and wisdom*! * What'^is the message that is given
me^to communicate next Suncjay?* Religitti
in the mind is not credulity„‘an4 in the prac-
tice is not form. It is a life. It Is the order and
soundness of a man. It id not something else
to be gotf to be added^ but is a new life of those
faculties you have. It is to do right. It is to love,
it is to serve, it is to think, it is to be humble.

Ethan Allen Crawford’s,
White Mountains, July 14, 1832.

%

There is nothing to be said. Why take the*
pencil ? I believe something will occur. A slight

1 Probably in the viflagc church.

. , 832 ] MEDITATIONS 493

momenfum wot|jid send the planet to roll foi'-
ever, at^d the laws of thought afe not unlike.
A thought,* I said, is a country wide enough for
an Active mind. It jinrolls, it unfojds, it shows
unlimited senses within itself. A few pains, a few
pleasures, — how easily we arcfamused, how easily
scared. A too bejievolent man is at the mercy of
every fop h^^meetf, and every householder. His
w'illingneis to please withdraws him from him-
self. Sure he ought to^ please, but not please at
the* expense of his own view by accommodation.

“ Imitation is a leaning on something foreign ;
incompleteness of individual devefopment ; de-
fect of free utteragce.”

■ Edinburgh Review, no. cx.

“ Ah me,” said the mourner to me, “ how

• *

njfturat he looked when they had pufcon.his
dickey ! ”

“ It 'was thi? that caught him,” said the
wife to me, touching her pearl carring.

MEDITATIONS

The golden days of youth are gone,

The hours of sun and hope ; And round thee —

How hard to conijmand the soul, or to
solicit the soul. Many of our actions, many of

494 JOURNAL. [Age 29

rhine, are done to solicit the [soul. PUt awfty
yourflesh, put on your faculties. I woul/i think,
I w'ould feel. I would be the vehicle of' that
divine principle that lurks \yithin, and of which
life has afforded only glimpses e;;iough‘to assure
me of its being. We know little of its laws, "but
we have observed that a north .wind, clear, cold,
with its scattered fleet of drifting cfcjuds, braced
the body, and seemed to reflect a sina^ar abyss
of spiritual heaven between clouds in our minds;
or a brisk conversation moved this miglity
deep, or a ^word in a book was made an omen
of by the ipihd and surcharged with meaning,
or cn oration, or a «oouth wind, or a college, or
a cloudy lonely walk, — “ striking the electric
chain wherewith we art darkljr .bound.” And
having this experience, we strive to avail our-
selves of it, and propitiate the divine inmate to
speak to us again out of clouds and darkness.
Truly, whilst it speaketh not,*man is a pitiful
being. He whistles, eats, sleeps, gets his gun,
makes his bargain, lounges, sins, and when all is
done is yet wretched. Let the soul speak, and
all this drivelling and these toys are thrown,
aside and man listens like a child.

The good of going ijtito the mountains is
that life is reconsidered ; it is far from the.slav-

,832] T{iE MOUNTAINS 495

cry of your ow| modes of living, and you ha^e
opport’^xnity of viewing the ’towir at such a ^is-
tanie as*may afford you a.just view, noii ca*i
ydb have any sucji mistaken apprehension as
might He expected from the place you occupy
anfl the round of oustoms yt>u run at home.

He who,lielievJ;s in inspiration will come here
to seek ^ He who believes in the wood-loving
muses must woo them here, and he who believes
in the reality of his soul will therein find inspira-
tion, and muses, and God, and will cqpie out here
to undress himself of pedantfy arili ^udge nght-
eou* judgment, ajid worship the First Cause.

* The reason wjiy we lik» simplicity of charac-
ter, the reasOte yliy griiwn men listen with un-
tiring interest to a liyely child is the same, viz.,
it* is something more than man, above man,>and
we hearken with a curiosity that has something
of awe*. We sffould so listen to every man, if
his soul spake, but it does not; his fears speak,
his senses speak, and he himself seldom.

WHITE MOUNTAINS

July 15, 183 a.

A few low mountains, a great many clouds al-
ways^covering the great peaks, a circle of woods

49 ^ JOURNAL. . [Age 29

to the horizon, a peacock on tl^? fence Or in the
yard, and two>travellWs no better contended than
njyself in the plain parlour of this house Aiake
u^ the whole picture of this upsabbatized Sunday.
But the hours pass on, creep ^r fly, hnd bear
me and my fellows to the decision of questibns
of duty; to the crises of our fate; and to the
solution of this mortal problcijTX M^elcome and
farewell to them ; fair come, fair go. Ged is, and
we in him. ^ • ,

The hour of decision. It seems not worth while
for l;hem w^o charge others with exalting forms
abo'Ve the ipoon to fear forms themselves with
extravagant dislike.* 1 am so j\lace<d that myi ali-
quid ingenii may be brought into useful action.
Let me not bury my ta'ent irt ih* earth in my
indignation at this windr^ill. But though the
thing may be useless and even pernicious, 3o not
destroy* what is good and useful in a high degree
rather than comply with what is Hurtful in a small
degree. The Communicant celebrates on a foun-
dation either of authority or of tradition an or-
dinance which has been the occasion to thousands,

— I hope to thousands of thousands, — of con-
trition, of gratitude, of prayer, of faith, ^f love and
of holy living. Far be it fjorn any of my friends,

— God forbid it be in my heart, — to interrupt

,183*] the communion rite 497

‘ any occasion thas Ijlessed of God’s influences
upon the human mind. I VUl not, because we
may^no^ al! think alike of the means, fight so
strsnuously.against the means, as to miss of tfle
end which we all value alike. I think Jesus did
nSwnean to institute a perpetual celebration, but
that a commemoration of him would bS useful.
Others think; th^ujesus did establish this one.
We are agreed that one is useful, and we are
agreed I Tiope in the way in which it must be
made useful, viz., by each one’s making it an
original Corymemoration.

I know very ^ell that it is a«bad«ign in a lf! 5 n
to be, too conscientious, and |tick af gnats. The
'niR>*st desperate scoundrels Jiave been the over-
refiners. Withpi^accoi|imodation society is im-
practicable. But this ordinance is esteemed the
‘ mflst sftcred of religious institutions, and I can-
not go habitually to an institution which they
esteem holiest v#<th indifference and dislike.

GEORGE FOX

George Fox, born 1624, son of a weaver, was
j)ut out to a shoemaker, and for him tended
sheep. In 643-44] he began his wanderings,
dressed always in leather clothing for strength’s
sake, and suffering much from hunger, thirst.

498 JOURNAL [Age 29

.want of lodging, imprisonment and abuse. He
taught that the Scriptures couid not be under-
stood but by the same spirit thatgave them forth.
Kails had been built about the communion table

* r-

in churches about , and the house in which

the Episcopalians worshipped of course was Only
called ‘‘the Church.” These things moved
George’s indignation very mu^b . He called them
steeple-houses, and on almost all occ^ions pre-
ferred to preach out of doors. When the church
was manifestly the only convenient place, he
wejjt in. He told the priests that he was no
nlaii-madejjiiest*

“The visible,” me said, “covereth the invis-
ible sight in you.” f,

“It pleased the Lord to sh^w him that the
natures of those things which were hurtful with-
out were also within in the minds of wicked
men, and that the natures of dogs, swine, vi-
pers, etc., and those of Cain, Ishmael, Esau,
Pharaoh, etc., were in the hearts of many peo-
ple. But since this did grieve him, he cried to
the Lord saying, — Why should I be thus, see-
ing 4 was never addicted to commit those evils?
And inwardly it was answered him. That it was
needful he should have a sense of all condi-
tions.” — “About that time it happened that

GEORGE FOX

. *83*]

499

welkin^ in the town of Mansfield by the steer
ple-hous^ side it was inwardly told him, ‘ That
whidh pedple trample upon must be thy fo^oS/
And at the.saying of this it was ogened to hlin
that it wis the life of Christ people did trample
on,* and that they i(pd one another with words,
without minding that thereby the bloo'd of the
Son of GodaWSiS trampled under foot.” (Sew-
ell, vol. v)

• Thoroughly consistent he was; how much
mo'l'e than other reformers. A consistent re-
former. The natural growth, by reaction, pf a
formal church.* “Words, w#rds,*^e feed^tlhe
another with words,” — he said. would have
the substance of religion sfen and obeyed. All
his prophetic%rbapso(^s are directed at some
moral offence. Thejr put him in prison. He
saV tlfe evils of the jail “ and laid before .the
judges what a hurtful thing it was that prison-
ers shdUld lie Idhg in jail, because they learned
wickedness one of another in talking of their
bad deeds ; and that therefore speedy justice
ought to be done.”

He also wrote to them about the evil of*put-
ting to death for stealing. {Fox’s Life.)

In jail, there was a conjurer who threatened
to raise the devil and break the house down.

500 JOURNAL [Acb 29

But George went to him apd ?aid, “ Come, kt
us see what tjiou canst do, and do thy worst:
the devil is raised high enough in thee alrejidy ;
bwt* the power of God chains him down.” »At
the undaunted speech, the fellow slunk away.
They gave him liberty to walk a mile from jail,
hoping he would escape. Socrates-like, he would
not. They offered him boynty jf he would
serve against Charles. He said his„ weapons
were not carnal. A band of volunteers chose
him their captain. Still he refused.

Col. threatened to kill the Quakers.

“f’wre’s myt hai«-,” said G. Fox, “here's my
cheek, and here’s any shoulder.” The cojonel
and his companions stood amazed, and said,
“if this be your principle, as you, say, we never
saw the like in our lives. ’ To which Fox said,
“What I am in words, I am the same i« lift.”

Practical good sense he had, when, at the
request of someone, he lay doxm on a bed to
refute the rumour that he never slept in a bed.

A reformer putting ever a thing for a form.
“My allegiance,” he said, “doth not consist
in swearing, but in truth and faithfulness.”

Swedenborg “considered the visible world
and the relation of its parts as the dial plate of

^,832] GOD THE SOUL 501

the invisible one." ,Q,\xottdi\n New Jerusalem,
Magazin^ior July, 183a.* *

GOD

I have^ complained that the ackitbwiedgment
06 pod’s presence halts far behind the fact.
What is it intended*to be but the tribute to one
without whose ntovings no tribute can be paid,
for no tributary can be? One without whom no
man or beast or nature subsists ; one who is
thejife of things, and from whose creative will
our life and the life of all creatures flows every
moment, wave *fter wave, like t|ie»succe5sii>e
beams that every moment issue fi;ptn the Sun.
•Sy,«h* is God, or he is nothing. What is God
but thS name of«the Soul a^the centre by which
all things are *w^at t\/Ly are, and so our exist-
• enfe is.proof of his? 'We cannot think of our-
selves and how our being is intertwined with
his witl^out awe^nd amazement.

[truth immortal]

August II.*

The truth is not injured nor touched though
thousands of them that love it fall by the way.

1 The Jerusalem Magazine was the Swedenborgian
organ.

2 Mr. Emerson was acutety ill in that week. — Ed.

502 JOURNAL [Age 29

Serene, adorable, eternal it lives* though Goethe,
Mackintosh, Cuvier/Bentham, Wegel (Jie in their
places, which no living men can fill/ *

repairs'

.The errors that the moon and earth mak»i m
the heavens in a long period of time, an equal
period repairs ; the seventh Pleiad, was lost and
is found ; the sweet fern dies, but revives ; as much
rain as the mountain sheds in forming torrents
is replenished by visitingclouds. But these are far-
off sjgns of compensation. Before tea I counted
not iiiyself worth r, brass farthing, and now I am
filled with tliough^s and pleasures and am as
strong and infinite a? an angel. So when, one of
these days, I see this bo'ly going to ruin like an
old cottage, I will remem oer that after the ruin
the resurrection is sure. ...

The principle of repairs is in us, the remedial
principle. Everybody perceives greatest c6ntrasts
in his own spirit and powers. To-day he is not
worth a brown cent, to-morrow he is better than
a million. He kicks at riches and could be hon-
oured and happy with nothing but arrowroot and
balm tea. This we call being in good or bad spir-
its. It is only in the bad fit, that we doubt and
deny and do ill, and we know well at that time that

1832] A MpDERN PLUTARCH 503

sorrow Will comfc for the bad action ; and sorrow
is repair^s^and b^iefin the powers and perpetuity
of ri^an wilf return, and we shall be magnified by
trvftt in God. Wheji, therefore, I cjpubt and sin,
I will looTc up at^he moon, and, remembering that
its ’errors are all periodical ; t will anticipate the
return of my owi spirits and faith.

Patricl* Henry’s speech full of religion.

[real antiquity]

Our upstart antiquities hide tl\pn?selve^iljJte
little children between the knees of sjAh a fatherly
pjace as London. ‘The bishop of London sits in
his cathedral b^a regular succession of twelve
hundred years.* liead Balgrave’s account of Saxon
re^giofi, vol. i, p. 5 /- . .

God = good. Man = wickedness. They be-
lieved in fliture^tate.

[a BRITISH Plutarch]

August 12.

The British Plutarch and the modern l*lu-
tarch is yej to be written. They that have writ
the lives of great men ji^ve not written them from
love ^d from seeing the beauty that was to be de-

504 JOURNAL. [Age 29

sired in them. But what would (Operate s'uch gra-
cious motions upon tfie spirit as the deat^ of Lord
Cobham and of Sir Thomas More, and a cen-
sure of Bacon, and a picture of George Fox and
Hampden, and the chivalrous integrity of Walter
Scott, and a true portrait of Sir Harry Vane, and
Falkland, and Andrew Marvell? I would draw
characters, not write lives. T would evoke the
spirit of each, and their relics might rot. Luther,
Milton, Newton, Shakspeare, Alfred, a light*of
the world, — Adams. I would walk among the
dry bones, .^nd wherever on the face of the earth I
fouri^d a living ma»i, I would say, here is life, and
lifejs communicable. Jesus Christ truly said. My
flesh is meat indeed. I am the bread, for of his lire
or character have the nations Vof *he earth been
nourished. Socrates I should like well, if I dared
to take him. I should repeat Montaigne though.
I would n’t.

“ Eyes that the beam celestial view
Which evermore makes all things new.”

These I claim as sole qualification, ewe-lamb.
I wduld make Milton shine. I would mourn,
for Bacon. I would fly in the face of every
cockered prejudice, feudal or vulgar, and speak
as Christ of their good and evil.

.183*] SPEAK YOUR OWN WORD 505

|[iaEAL men]

Whei^Y^ look at the world of past men, we
say, ^hat a host of heroes ; but when we c®t^e
to particulaVize, it 4s like countii^ the stars
wljich we thought innumerable, but which prove
few and rare. Bacon* Shakspe*are, Cassar, Scipio,
Cicero, Burke, Ghatham, Franklin, — none of
them will beat examination, or furnish the type
of a Man*

\^hat we say, however trifling, must have its
roots in ourselv^es, or it will not mc^ve otbere.
No speech should be separate fro'Tn# our being
Jik^ jf plume or a ^losegay, but like a leaf or a
flower *or ^a bucf^ though Ae topmost and re-
motest, yet join<sd hyy continuous lino of life
,to the trunk and the seed.

CHOLERA TIMES

August 17.

It would be good to publish Girard’s heroism
in yellow fever at Philadelphia, and Dr. Rush’s
account .of his own practice, to stimulate the
^owed benevolence of this dismal time.

We are tjp act doubtless in our care of our
own health as if ther^ were no other world.
We a^p to be punctilious in our care. No caution

506 JOURNAL [Agb *9

is unseemly. This is the desigPi of Providence.
But we are to recognize, in evtt-y inst^t of this
creeping solicitudf, that happy is the left of
those to whom the unspeajcable secrets of' the
other state are disclosed. When our own hour
comes, when every^ medicine and means has been
exhausted, we are then to S3y to the angel.
Hail ! All Hail ! and pass "io whatever God
has yet to reveal to the conscious spirit. Why
should we dread to die, when all the good and
the beautiful and the wise have died, and earth
holds noticing so good as that whiph it has lost,
fiut'oh ! lef. tiot life be valued, when that which
makes the value of'life is lost. It is only axlean
conscience, the kno’vledge that we are beloved
by our friends, and des? rve to-b. beloved, that
can persuade an honourable mind to pray that
its being may be prolonged an hour; but to
outlive your own respect, to live when your
acquaintance shall shrug their shoulders, apd
count it a disgrace to you the breath that is yet
in your nostrils, — I shall be glad to be told
what is the pleasure, what is the profit that is
worth buying at such a price.

August 18.

To be genuine. Goethe, they say, was wholly
so. The difficulty increases with the gifts of the

BE GENUINE

183a]

507

individual. A p|ough-boy can be, but a minis-
ter, an oMtor, arf ingenious^hinker how hardly !
Geo«ge*TO'k was. “ What I am in words,” *he
said, “ I an? the same in life.” Swedenborg w%s.
“My wntings will be found,” he said, “another
s^f.” George Washington was; “the irre-
proachable Was|iington.” Whoever is'genuine,
his ambitiog ig ^xactly proportioned to his
powers. height of the pinnacle determines
the breadth of the base.

A SUBJECT FOR A SERMON

0/fugUSt

Reverence man, and not Plat# and Caesar,
wherever ther^is sense, agflexion, courage, ad-
mit it to The ^ipe hoi^ur, — embrace it, quote
it from a truckman vk quick as from Webster.
IPyod cannot get the habit of seeing qual-
ities except in the great, if anything nevbshould
sgring’up, it \^11 be lost to you. “Socrates,”
says Montaigne, “ makes his soul move a nat-
ural and common motion. ‘ A country peasant
said this; a woman said that.' . . . He has
done human nature a great kindness in show-
ing it how much it can do of itself We are all
of us richer than we jthink we are, but we are
taught to borrow and to beg, and brought up

508 JOURNAL [Age 29

piore to make use of what is at other’s ^han our
own.”

He was content to stand by, anJ'itt reason
argue for him.”

Potentissimus est qui se habet in poteHate.

Seneca '

The sublime of morals seems ever to be of
this kind, frail man intimating this defiance of
the universe and gathering himself ihto his
shell. Every grand sentiment of religion, far as
it flies, comes back to self. As when you say,
** the gods approve the depth, but not the ta-
mul,., of the soul,” the sublime of it is, that
to the soul itself, depth, not tumult, is desire-
able.” When you s/iy, “Jupiter prefers integ-
rity to charity,” your fnest meaning is, “the'
soul prefers,” etc. When Jesus saith, “he that
givjeth one of these little ones a cup of cold
water shall not lose his reward,” is not the best
meaning, “ the love at which the giver has
arrived”? “Every plant which my heavenly
Father hath not planted shall be rooted up,”
“everything is transitory but what hath its life
front the interior of the soul,” and so on
through the New Testament there is not a just *
or grand thought but is made more round and
infinite by applying it to tbe soul considered as

183*] THE OVERSOUL 509

•

thj 5 uni^^erse, living from God within. Consider
the sensa of such propositJbns as the pure in
hear^shih See God.” ^

Ic not th§n all objective theologj^a discipliife,
an aid, to* the immature intellect until it is equal
to'rfie truth, an 5 can poise it«elf. Yet God for-
bid that I should one moment lose sight of his
real eternal ]^eiijg,of my own dependence, my
nothingness whilst yet I dare hail the present
deity §t my heart.

’The understanding ’speaks much ; the pas-
sions much ^ the soul seldom. The only friend
that can^p^rsuafle the soul tow sperfk is a gboff
and great cause. Out it colfces n€w and then
like thjs lightnijjg from it% cloud, and with an
effect as pfodigiqus.

September 5.

Hypocrisy is the attendant of false-seligion.
When people imagine that others can b« their
priests, ‘they may well fear hypocrisy. When-
ever they understand that no religion can do
them any more good than they actually taste,
they have done fearing hypocrisy.

[On September 9th, Mr. Emerson met his
congregation again. In his sermon, he simply
and freely stated his* opinion, that Jesus did

^lO JOURNAL ^ [Age 29

•not intend to establish a perpetual observance
when he ate the* Passover With his/disciples ;
an(J further, that ,it was not expedld^nt te cele-
brate it as ^as then done, in his K:hurch.'*For
this opinion he gave his reasons, dr&wn from
the Scriptures. He then stated what seemed to
him real objections to the customary observ-
ance. Finally, since the chi^nges- he had pro-
posed had not recommended themselves to the
worshippers at the Second Church, he resigned
his pastoral charge, “ Because,” he said, “it is
my. desire^ in the office of a Chrisdan minister,
to ao nothing which I cannot cfo with, my whole
heart.” His people did not wish to part with
him. Meetings were held in hopes of arranging
some way of keeping h'^m, but ?t last his resig-
nation was reluctantly accepted, and he and his
psople parted in peace. (See Sermon oh “ The
Lord '3 Supper ” in Miscellanies ; also Cabot’s
and Holmes’s memoirs of Erfterson.)]*

September 14.

The true doctrine respecting forms js this, is
it not? — that Christianity aims to form in a
man a critical conscience, and that being formed,
he is constituted a judge,^the only and absolute
judge, of every particular form that the^ estab-

1832] LIEE, NOT DEATH 511

Hrfhed r^igion p^esettts to him. The discretioil
he exercJfees is lile the discretion 6f the ben(;h,
which hath nothing arbitrary^

JEvery*man fegls the strain of duty in a dif-
ferent place; L[o\Mell] in domiciliaries, I in
paraeneticks.

“ Think of Living.” Goethe.

'.Dofl’t tell me to g^t ready to die. I know
not what shall be. The only preparation I can
make is by^ulfilling my present dirties. Th];^
is the everlasting life.

X<J think of m©rtality m^es us queasy, <he
flesh creeps at ^mpath^ ^ith its kind. What
is the remedy^ tb ennoble it by animating it
.with love and uses. Cive the soul its ends to
pursue, and death becomes indifferent. It saith.
What have I to do with death ?

The vice of dalvinism has been to represent
the other world wholly different from this. So
that a preparation to live in this was all lost for
that.

I would very temperately speak of fifture
delights, '^ipployments, . . . solely from the
prophecy of the pow^sbthat are immortal. Not
by deicription to captivate, for the impenetrable

512 JOURNAL [Age *9

Veil, not to be lifted, .has beefh sliut down for th*at

* I

reason, to confine us to the present wh^^ all duty
andf excellence for us lies, — “ in seipso totui teres
atque rotundxs.

Truth and virtue teach the same thmg. It^is
in being good to \vife and children and servants
that the kingdom of heaven begins. It is in set-
tling punctually with your tafior, jfnd not hold-
ing out false hopes to young men.‘’Jt is not
over-praising your goocjs, or underrating ^bur
debtor’s goods. It is in forming your own judg-
tnent upoi* questions of duty. It Is in prefer-
ring a just fcct'to i l^ind one, and a kind- act to a
graceful one. It is In thus trying your poVers,,
and bringing out erffch^one in/order,. U mil the
whole moral man live^^and and governs
the animal man.

It is no argument against the future state, the
ignorafice of man, no more than the lifelessness
of the egg is a proof that it shall not be a bird,
or the want of intelligence in the human embryo
a proof that it shall not be a reasoning speaking
man.

But this ignorance is argument as significant*
as a visible finger out of the sky, tha* ^e should
not fabricate a heaven i«.our heads, and then
square life to that fiction.

TRUTH

.‘832]

513

• Thest power?, ami these powers alone, con»
tain the tevelatidn of what*you can do and can
becotne* It is writ in no boojc. It can neve^lje
forStold or* imagined. Their’s is ,your sect^t.
T^hey at% your Jieaven, or they are your hell.
And their hell shall be whatever part of heaven
you miss of : i. it is the perversion oY a good
power that ;»ake3* your misfortunes.

[seek truth]

September 17.

I would gladly preach to the demigods oiC this
age (and why hot to the sinjple^gople PjT con-
cerning the reality of trutl^ ancKthe greatgess
^f believing ingt and seelling after it. It does
not shock us %^1^ ordifiary persons discover no
craving for truth, and^e content to existforyears
exclusively occupied with the secondary objects
of house and lands and food and company, and
never chst up theTr eyes to inquire whence it comes
and what it is for, wholly occupied with the play,
and never ask after the design. But we cannot

forgive.it in the s and s that they who

have souls to comprehend the magnificent secret
should wttjrly neglect it and seek only huzzas
and champagne. M^y. quarrel with the vulgar
grea^ men is that they do not generously give

514 JOURNAL [Age 29

themselves to the measures .which they ‘meddte
with ; they do.not espouse the tilings they would
doj^ live in the life of the cause they Vo'uldr for-
wald and faint in its failure, but they.are casting
sheep’s eyes ever upon their own by-ends ; their
pert individuality is.ever and ^non peeping ouf to
see what Way the wind blows, ancj where this boat
will land them, whether it is likely they will dine
nicely and sleep warm. That for t\itfyrst thing,
that choosing action rather than contemplation}
they only half act, they only give their hands' or
tongyes, and not themselves to their works.
*‘My against them is,, thgt they

Jack^ faith in nftjo’s moral nature. They can have
no enthusiasm, for the deep and/nfinite.p^rt of
man, out of which onl^ sublime.'thought and
emotions can proceed, is ryd from them.

Socrates believed in man’s moral nature arfd
knew aed declared the fact that virtue was the
supreme beauty. He was capaUle therefore 0/
enthusiasm.

Jesus Christ existed for it. He is its Voice to
the world. Phocion felt it, recognized it, but was
a man of action, true in act to this conviction.
Luther, More, Fox, Milton, Burke, ev«ry great
man, every one with whose character the idea
of stability presents itself, had this faith.

CARLYLE

>832]

515

• The true mefl are ever following an invisible
Leader, 'and h^e left the fesponsibleness of
theii* ac?s Vith God. But the artificial men J^ave
assfimed their own, bonds and car^fall back*on
nothing ‘greater J;han their finite fortunes; . . .
em*pirics with expedients for a few years, reputa-
tion instead of character, and fortune instead of
wisdom. Tj^ 6ru^ men stand by and let reason
argue forrfhem. I talk with Sampson and see it
h nol»him, but a greater than him, “ My Father
is greater than I.” Truth speaks by him. (Can
my friend wish a greater eulogy ?) ^

Whatever I say that is gocjd oif^l^ie Suifdays,
I sp«ak with fervo^ir and auSiorit^ — surely,not
feeling that it reists on my %ord, or has only the
warrant of m^i faulty character, but that I got it
from a deeper and c<^mon source, and it is as
much addressed to me as to those I speak to.

[carlyle]

October i.

I am cheered and instructed by this paper on
Corn Law Rhymes in the Edinburgh by my
Germanick new-light writer, whoever he be.
He gi.v^ ;ps confidence in our principles. He
assures the truth-lpy;jEr everywhere of sym-
pathj^. Blessed art that makes books, and so

516 JOURNAL. [Age 29

joins me to that stranger by ^his perfect raH-
road.

[sovereignty of ethics]'

*Has the (joctrine ever tyjen fairly preached
of man’s moral nature ? The wljole wofld holds
on to formal Christianity, and nobody teacties
the essential truth, the heart of*Christianity, for
fear of shocking, etc. Every tfasher, when once
he finds himself insisting with all his might
upon a great truth, turns up the ends of it?
last with a cautious showing bow it is agreeable
t.g^the life jnd teaching of Jesus, as if that was
any recomiji?*iidatjon, as if the blessedness of
Jesus’ life anS' teai^iing were, not because •tljey
were agreeable to th^ truth. Wfll, this'csipples
his teaching. It bereaves^he tf(itl! he inculcates
of more than half its for^e, by representing it
as something secondary that can’t stand alone.
The truth of truth consists in this, that it is
self-evident, self-subsistent. It is light. You
don’t get a candle to see the sun rise.

Instead of making Christianity a vehicle of
truth, you make truth only a horse for. Chris-
tianity. It is a very operose way of making,
people good. You must be humljl5*!*.because
Christ says, “ Be humbl#.’,’ “ But why must I
obey Christ?” “Because God sent him.”* But

1832] TERRIBLE FREEDOM 517

how do I know dodjsent him ? Because your ow?j
heart teaches tlie same thfhg he taught. Why
then^sh^lhl not go to my own heart at first?

•the terrible freedom

October 2.

It well deserves attention what is said* in New
Jerusalem Magazine concerning External Re-
straint. It is* awml to look into the mind of
man and»see how free we are, to what frightful
excesses our vices may »un under the whited wall
of a respectable reputation. Outside, among
your fellows, among strangers, y^ •must^’prc*
serve appearances, a hundred thiijgs*you cannot
»(io^ but inside, tlfe terrib^^ freedom ! *

October 9.

“ I teach by ’degi^s,” says Landor’s Epi-
cutus. ft is not the will but the necessk) of the
wise. None are wise enow to teach otherwise.
All this pedantry about the peoples not bear-
ing the whole truth, — what else does it mean
than that the teacher has not yet arrived at the
safe, that is, the true statement of the particu-
lar doctrine which he would oppose to tha rul-
ing erroj> He knows in general there is an

I Compare the early poenj beginning, “ How much, pro-
tecting God, to thee I owe.*’ Poems, Appendix.

518 JOURNAL [Age 29

error; he has not yet faund its boundary
lines

An our art is how to use what the'^o'od God
provides us. There is water enough ; we are ofily
so to shape aqueducts as to brinjg it to cAir door.
There is air enough ; we must only so build* as
that it sh’all ventilate our hous^ So with man’s
education. There is truth enjough*: only open
the mind’s door, and straighten the ^passages.
There are men enough ; only so place yourself
to them in true position {en rapport)^ i. e.,*by
amity, as to suck the sweetness *of society.
TlierC is pojv^ and happiness enough. .

«

I will not live out of #iie.

I will not see with otherV eyes
My good is good, my evilV?.

I would-be free ; I cannot be

While^ I take things as others please to rate them.

I dare attempt to lay out my ow% road.

That which myself delights in shall be Good,

That which I do not want, indifferent ;

That which I hate is Bad. That ’s flat.

Henceforth, please God, forever I forego
The yoke of men’s opinions. I will be.
Light-hearted as a bird anjJ ^ve with God.

I find him in the bottom of my heart.

1832] GOD WITHIN 519

I heaf continuilly Jiis Voice therein,

And books, a«d priests, Snd worlds, I less es>
^ tcenA.

Who says the heart ’s a blind guide ? It is nof.«
My h^art did nevel" counsel me to lin.
j wonder where it got its wisdom.

For in the darkest ^naze, amid the sweetest baits
Or amid horricf dangers, never once
Did that gftitft angel fail of his oracle.

The li^l^e needle always knows the north.

The little bird remembereth his note.

And this wise Seer never errs.

I never ta*ight it what it teaches me, ^

I only follow when I act aright. ‘

Whence then did this omniSpient spirit come
Vrom it came. It is tiie Deity.

October 13.

^“Ifjrhou lovest tfue glory, thou rr» tst trust
her truth.” “She followeth him who doth hot
turn and gaze a^ter her.” Landor.

“ Smce all transcendent, all true and genuine
greatness must be of a man’s own raising and
only op the foundations that the hand of God
has laid, do not let any touch it ; keep them off
civill)^J*<l^ keep them off.” Landor.

I Printed in Poems, among Poems of Youth: Appcndia,
Cent^ary Ed.

520

JOURNAL

[Age z9
October 13.

Exhortations and 'examples <are better than
psalms and sermon.,

We have thoughts, but wq don’t know what
to do with them; materials, but^we can^; man-
age or dispose. Wc cannot^get high enougfi
above them to see their order jn reason. We
cannot get warm enough to Jiave «them exert
their natural affinities and throw themselves
into crystal. We see a new sect devoted to*
certain ideas, and we go to individuals of it *to
have jthem explained.* Vain expectation ! The/
are pOssesse^Svitlv the ideas, but do no 4 : pos-
sess Jthem.

[the lioht withiij] ,

Chardon ^'v.'y^cto^ef* 1832.

The great difficulty is thkt men do not.thinic
enough of themselves, do not consider what it
is that they are sacrificing, when ,fhey follo,w in a
herd, or when they cater for their establishment*.
They know not how divine is a man. I know
you say. Such a man thinks too much of himself.
Alas! he is wholly ignorant. He yet wanders
in the outer darkness, in the skirts and shadows
of himself, and has not seen his inner* light.

Q r#

1 Probably referring to the Swedenborgians.

1832] YOUR OWN WAY 521

Wovrid it not\>e the text of a useful discourse
to young m&ny*that every* man must learn in a
diffei^enfi'Oohy ? How much is lost by imitation !
Oiir best ftiends may be our worst enemies.* A
man shcwld learn to detect and foster that gleam
*0?* light which fla^shes across his mind from
within far more ^han the lustre of [tlfe] whole
firmament yitbcmt. Yet he dismisses without
notice his^peculiar thought because it is peculiar.
The time will come when he will postpone all
acquired knowledge t*o this spontaneous wis-
dom, and ^ill" watch for this illumination piore
than those wlTo watch for the #ftjrning? For
this*is the princij)le by whi^ th#'other is tp be
Arranged. Thi^ thinking %^ould go to show the
significance (jf •self-education ; that in reality
there is no other; foj^ all other is nought with-
out thfs.

A man must teach himself htcasist that which
each can do beA, none but his maker can teach
him. No man yet knows what it is, nor can,
till that person has exhibited it. Where is the
master that could have taught Shakspeare?
Where is the master that could have instiHJCted
Fraq^pf or Washington, or Bacon, or New-
ton ? Every great man is an unique. The Scip-
ionism of Scipio is just that part he could not

£11 JOURNAL [Ace zg

borrow. . . . Every man comes^ at the com moa
results with most 'conviction i.i his oWn way.
But he only uses a different vocabulary from
yoUrs ; it comes to the same, thing. •

An imitation may be pretty, comica?, popu-
Jar, but it never cair be great Buonaparte mim-
icked THemistocles. If anybody will tell me
who it is the great man imitates in -the original
crisis when he performs a great ac^, — who
Muley Molok imitated, or Falkland, or Scipio,
or Aristides, or Phocion, or Fox, or More, or
Alfred, or Lafayette, I will tell him who else
can teach him? "har. himself, A man has-got to
learn that he n?ast embrace the truth, or shall
never know it; that'co be thankful for a little
is the way to get more. He is; tv work him-
self clear of how much noasense and mischief.
He is to learn, like the Persian, to speak the
truth. -

[thought and speech]

Do you say that a mechanic must attend to
language and composition? You are looking
the wrong way and seeking the source in the
river. Strong thinking makes strong lai:g”age;
correct thinking, correct speech.

m832] TRU.TH MANY-SIDED 523

[nCTHING wfTHIN],

S. igaN^e’a sad definition of. his friend in ^ay-
ing*he resembled % nest of Indiaji boxes, dhe
^fter th^ other, jsach a new puzzle, and when
you come to the last there i% nothing in it. So
with each man, a splendid barricade of circum-
stances, the aenovfp of his name, the glitter of
his coach^«then his great professional character,
th.en (sames another fine shell of manners and
speech, — but go behind all these and the Man,
tfle self, is « poor, shrunken, distorted, imper-_
ceptible* thing.

October 17.

The surve)Soit*goeth about taking positions
to serve as the point^of his angles, and thereby
afterwards he finds the place pf the inountain.
The philosopher in like manner selects* points
whence* he can look on his subject from differ-
ent sieves, and by means of many approximate
results he at last obtains an accurate expression
of the truth.

That statement only is fit to be made pdiblic
whiclta^lfjjave got at in attempting to satisfy
your own curiosity.. For himself, a man only
want^ to know how the thing is ; it is for other

524 JOURNAL , [Age 29.

people that he wants to know what "may be
said about it. '

Octdbir 1.9.

Landor said, “The true philosophy is the
only true prophet.” May I not add, the whole
Future is in the bottom of the heart. Jung
Stilling said of Goethe, “ The man’s heart,
which few know, is as true and noble as his
genius, which all know.” If Carlyle knew what
an interest I have in his persistent goodness,
would it not be worth one effort more, one
p^rayer, one meditation? But will he resist the
Deluge of. bad example in £'.ngland? One
mau.ifestation ' of goodness in a noble 'soul
brings him in debt to' all the beholders’ that he
shall not betray their love and' tfust which he
has awakened. — {Mem.')' Fraser s Magazine,
vol. Ill, March, 1831, Carlyle’s notice of
Schiller.

Mr. N. K. G. Oliver died on board ,U. S.
ship Potowmac, Commodore Downes. He was
Commodore’s Secretary. The crew subscribed
^2080 for the relief of his destitute family.

The sum raised in Boston for the tdi«.^vf the
Cape de Verde islanders suffering from famine
was about $ 6 Soo.

.183*] RESIGNS PASTORATE 525

|[MA%y MOODY Emerson]

had an eye thatywent througl^and
thrt)ugh yoga like a^needle. “She vjas endowrti,”
she sai(J, “ with^ the fatal gift of penetration.”
^"Ke disgusted everybody beaause she knew them
too well.

To liv* in a field of pumpkins, yet eat no pie !

October 28, 1832.

The vo^ On the question proposed to the
proprietors of\he Second Ckuro^f^his efening
stoo 4 thus, Ayes J5 ; nays 5 *|- ; bhfnks 2. Oii the
Acceptance of t|ie pastor’^ letter, ayes 30 ; nays
20 ; blanks 4V

He who would write heroic pocrtis should
make his whole life an heroic poem.”

Milton.

SCHILLER

I propose to myself to read Schiller, of whom
I hear much. What shall I read ? His Robbers P
Oh no, for that was the crude fruit of hfs im-
matw»*iffgid. He thought little of it himself.

1 This is the only direct* mention in this journal of Mr.
Eme«on’s parting from his church.

526 JOURNAL . [Age 29

What then : hissesthetics ? Oh no, that is 6nly his
struggle with Kanteah metaphysics. His poetry ?
Oh no, for he was a poet only by study." His< his-
tories? — And so with all his, productions ; they
were the fermentations by which his mind was
working itself clear, they were the experi-
ments by' which he got his skill, and the fruit,
the bright pure gold of all was — - Schiller him-
self.

Carlyle says it was complained of SchUlet’s
Robbers that the moral was bad, or it had none,
and he saith, “but Schiller’s vindication rests on
higher grounds than these. His work has on the
whole furnished nourishment to the mere- ex-
alted powers of our na’ture ; the sentimentc and
images which he has shaped anti uttered, tend,
in spite of their alloy, to elevate the soul to a
nobler pitch ; and this is a sufficient defence,”
etc. The writer of a work, which interests and
excites the spiritual feelings of men, has as lit-
tle need to justify himself by showing how it ex-
emplifies some wise saw, or modern instance, as
the doer of a generous action has to demonstrate
its merit by deducing it from the system of
Shaftesbury, or Smith or Paley, or .i^hi'-hflver
happens to be the favourite system of the age
and place. The instructiveness of the one and

1832] THE SOUL’S INTEGRITY 527

ihe virtue of tVe j)ther exist independently pf
all syslemi or <}aws and ill spite pf all.”

Life of Schillh.

This is tantamount (is it not?^ to Aristotle’s
TSaxim, “We are ^purified jjy pity and terror.”
And thus is SJiakspeare moral, not of set pur-
pose, but ];)y,“ elevating the soul to a nobler
pitch.” §0 too are all great exciters of man moral ;
.in war and plague and shipwreck greatest virtues
ajJpear. Why, but thit the inmost soul which lies
tranquil qyery day is moved and speaks,? But
the inpiost sohl is God. Thf sp%ifc*passeB wheTe
the^lviin is interrupted.

November 6.

Pope is ^id* to have preferred tliis couplet
among his writingst —

“ Lo where Maeotis sleeps, and hardly flows
The freeziri^ Tanais ’mid a waste of snows.”

[public concern or private?]

A part of our anxiety for the welfare of the
State, that the elections should go well, psoceeds
pe^j^eiiture from our consciousness of personal
defect.

If the soul globe itself up into a perfect in-

528 JOURNAL [Age a'9

'tcgrity — have the absolute command of its de-
sires — it is less dependent on pther men, and
less> solicitous concerning what they do, albeit
with no loss of philanthropy. At least, that is
my thought from reading Milton’s beautiful vin-
dication of himself from the charge of inconci-
nence and intemperance. See voj. i, p. 239, etc.
Yet seemeth it to me that we shall all feel dirty
if Jackson is reelected.

[wasted, life]

Navember ii.

•*

'' Wh«vt is the grief we feel when a pian dies?
Is it not an uneasinesv. that nothing can be slid ?
He has done nothing :<he has been merely pass-
ive to the common influences th^t act oh all men.
And now that the great endowments proper to
every mar have passed away from this flesh, we
feel that the nothingness of life and character is
sad dispraise, and the affectionatir expressions of
friendship are apologetic. Certainly the feeling
would be very diflFerent if the departed man had
been an earnest self-cultivator, scattering streams
of useful influence on every side of him. Then
every tear that flowed would be a tribute of eu-
logy. Friends would not need to say anything,
his acts would speak for him. They would keep

’ids*] LitTLE THOUGHTS 529

«

,a j)roud, silence a rich consolation would shine
in all eyjss. iBut^now, let cwr. tears flow for the
vanity Qfj:nan, for the poor ^ssues of a God’s
chappy .

November 13.

We think so httle that we are always novices
in speculation. We’ think so little that every
new thought presented to us, even every old
thought in a* new 'dress of words, takes us by
sunrise and we are thus at the mercy of Goethe,
Kant, Cousin, Mackintosh, and even of Burton.
If, from their jiatural centre, our thoughts had
taken\i natural arrangement by frecyitfnt aiyf free"
exer^se, we should detect the faljphbod at sight
^ Vhatever was p 1 -oposed%to us on all the pri-
mary quesftiolljs.' As it i^, we can hardly stand
our ground agEdnst^the ready advocate of a
pravenJie.

Excellence is always brand new.

*A kingdom has the rig of a man-of-war; a
republic the rig of a merchantman.

Men in our day consent to war because the
antagonists are strangers. I know my neigh])our,
but the ^enchman, the Maylay, the Buenos
Ayrean ar^ no more to me than dramatis per-
sona.

530 JOURNAL [Acb 29,

The chief mourner does not always attend the*
funeral.

"A fine day is not a weather-breedcu, but a fine
day.

The whole future is in the bottom of the
heart.

“ ‘ What shall I teach you the foremost thing ? *

Could’st teach me off my own shadow to spring ? ”

Goethe, apud C.^rlyle.

[sartor resartus]

Uiiconscionsly we are furnis'hing comic ex-
amples, to all spectators, of ^cobwebbed ethical
rules. I go to the 'Atheneum and read that
“man is not a clothes-horse.,** and come out
and meet in Park St. my young friend who, I
understa-hd, cuts his own clothes, and who little
imagines that he points a paragraph for Thomas
Carlyle.

Goethe says, “Others will never spare you.”
So true is it that I am not reminded of my own
unfaithfulness when I animadvert upon it in C.

MISS MARGARET TUCKER

Saturday^ ii a. u .^ ^November 24, 1832,
died my sister, Margaret Tucker. Farewell to

183*] MARGARET TUCKER 531

^thee for a little tii^e, my kind and sympathiz-
ing sister, luro iejoice witlf Ellen, so lately lost,
in God? s» free and gloriousytmiverse. Tell ‘her,
if «he nee^s to be told, how dearly she re-
membered, how dearly valued. fJejoice together
mt you are free of your pa.inful corporeal im-
prisonment. I jnay well mourn your Joss,*forin
many sour ^ays*[ had realized the delicacy and
sweetnesg of a sister’s feeling. I had rejoiced
tQO, ^s 'always, in the gifts of a true lady, in
wlfom was never anything little or mean seen
©r suspectgd, who was all gentleness, puri^ and
sens^ with a ftre elevation ^f sgwtfmente. Gd 3
comfort the bitter lonely "hour* wliich the sor-
^owigg jnother must sM^d here.

Farewell, dev girl. 1 have a very narrow ac-
quaintance, ancf of i^ you have been a large part.
We aiTchor upon a few, and you huVe had .the
character and dignity that promised everything
to the esteem ^nd affection of years. Think
kindly of me, — I know you will, — but per-
chance the disembodied can do much more, can
elevate the sinking spirit and purify and urge
it to generous purposes. Teach me to* make
tri^, triples, and work with consistency and in
earnest to my true ends. The only sister I ever
ha<^ pass on, pure soul! to the opening heaven.

532

journal

[Agb tg

A wiuter’s day

Novanicr 27.

Instead of^ lectures on Architecture, I 'Vyill
make a lecture on God’s architecture, one of
his beautiful works, a Day. I will draw a
sketch of a Winter’s day. I wil’ trace, as I can,
a rude outline of the foundation and far-assem-
bled influences, the contribution of. the uni-
verse whereon this magical structure rise® like
an exhalation, the wonder and charm of the
immeasurable Deep. The bed of a day
Eterniwj, thg groipd plan is Space. T.hfe ac-
count of its gi Dwth is Astronomy. Its nearer
phenomena are Che/n^pry, Optics, Agricult-
ure, Hydrostatics, Animated Nature. It ends
again in Astronomy, when -t has carried forward
by its few rounded hours the immense Benefi-
cence.

This magic lanthorn with fresh pictures, this
microcosm, this Bridal of the earth and sky,
this God’s wonder, we cannot take to pieces
like a machine, but we may study its miracles
apart,*^one at a time, and learn how to find the
whole world, and every one of its pebbles, a
tongue.

The snovo is a self-weaving blanket with which

1^3*1 XVINTER 533

pafts of the’globe exposed to the cold, cov^r
the'hiselves^n pile proportioned their expos-
ure, ^whak •time the animat^ creation in *the^
same parts^ whiten and thicken their flexes.
The snow crystal, {nix columnar'^ hexagon, —
dihsum vellus tacitarum aqueurum.

Provision for, keeping the waters fluid T im-
mense force ^of, crystallizing water, — riving of
granite blocks. Powers of the Arctic winter.
B^ne^ceht effects upon the animal, vegetable,
niiiteral creation — mOst unknown ; defence of
trees, vegetable heat, e. g., last winter. Crunch^
ing o^t})e snoia^under the woo^sl^*

Dimiestic effects : pumpffq^zen ^thawed by salt.
^^ater pitcher craved ; it empty. CTocl too

fast ; len|;then^he penaulum. Gloves not thick
enough; exchange tl^em for mitten:^. Frost on
th» wmdowSy wood splits better^ and stgne
worse. Cat's back and flannel vest sparkle^ Flow-
ers, boes, ants,^ies, none; but instead, the
social apple, the breakfast honey, the good
provefb ; and the flies, plain-suited, we are
willing to spare, and their cousins the mus-
quitoes’ that make men draw up the • foot.
Ice trade/* fur trade, and country trade by
means of universal railroad; and conservative
powers of frost. Fuel- wood brought out of the

534 journal [Age 29

wood-lots; game easier procured; lime-kiln;
burned.

Games : skatirt^q;, sledding, sndW-building,
Esquimaux hunting with snow-shoes. <■
Winter evening. Reading, astronomical ob-
servations, electricity. ^

lildia-Tubber shoes ; Winter less interesting
here than in the North or in jch^^ South, but
beautiful. ^

{Memoranda for “The Winter's' Pay„’!)
Audubon ; Polar Regions ; Polehampton ; Dan-
iell Black.

The cholerc coi^c the ci^ of New ‘York
110,000 dollars, and^a.^vast additional e^^penst
to individuals. The Holy day» are said to cost
Spain ;^ 7 ,ooo,ooo sterling;a year.

WORDSWORTH,

December i.

I never read Wordsworth without cKagrin ;
a man of such great powers and ambition, so
near 'to the DU majores^ to fail so meanly in
every attempt! A genius that hath epilepsy, a
deranged archangel. Th,e ,Ode to Duty, con-
ceived and expressed in a certain high, severe

. 1*83*] MAlTHEMATfCS 535

^style, ^does^ yet mjss of greatness and of 4II
effect by sitch j^lsities or Als|s as,

*^Ai(d the most ancient heave/s thro’ thee are»fresh
and strong,”*

’vl^ich is throwmg^ dust in* your eyes, because
they have no snore to do. with duty ttfan a
dung-cart iyis* ^ that fine promising passage
about “l^ie mountain winds being free to blow
upon,th*ee,” etc., flats out into “ me and my bene-
diciions.” If he had tut in his Dictionary for
Words, he j:ouId hardly have got worse.

"[compulsory MArj^fEMAT^Cs]

Aipong things to byteformed at college is
this miserab^ •practice of leading ingenuous
youth blindfold thi|)ugh trigonometry and the
other lhathematics. The first scho’at tells jne
that *he can understand a page at a time’ ; and
young* Appletdh * himself suggests the great
good of having a preliminary treatise, often re-
ferred to in the main body, apprizing the reader
what it all drives at. Now he has no idea.
There are two sorts of cut bono, however. Jf the

i^Eithcr Thomas Gold Appleton (cla«s of i83t)» Ae
well-known wit of Boston later, or William Channing Apple-
ton ^claaa of 183a).

536 journal [Aoe 29.

bx)y sees the truth and beauty of the problem;,
he may well remafh i)gnorant an<l indifferent for
a time as to its pr^:tical applications^ 'fiftt if he
discern neither necessary truth nor utilityi he
has got stone for bread. “Teach me,” Said the
young Syracusan to Archimedes, “the dirmF
art by which you have saved* your country.”
“Divine, do you call it?” s»d A, “It is in-
deed divine, but so it was before it , •saved the
city. He that woos the goddess, must forget
the woman.”

Nv'ne spalls another, yet it pleases me
That none to any'-is indifferent.

No heart in all this«^i^orld is separate.

But all are cisterns or one cenfra), sea :

All are mouthpieces of tl\^ Eternal Word.

[postscript to “a winter’s day”]

The good earth, the planet An which We aye
embarked and making our annual voyage in the
unharboured Deep, carries in her bosom every
good thing her children need on the way, for
refreshment, fuel, science, or action. She has
coal in the hold, and all meats in theIarder,And
overhung with showiest ayrping.

The progress of art is to equalize all places.

I'Sj*] TO SAMPSON 537

B.eind€<;r, caoufchouc, glass windows, anthracite
coah Nott (Stoves, coffee, «nd books will give
Greenland* the air and ease/of London. Ice^
fruits, baths, refrigerators, linen, will fatf'^the
hot forehead qf Cuba to the 56tir degree.
''^Dangers. The snow-storm.

Capt. ^^rry\ frozen men.

Degree of col^ tolerable to man, — 58. Tem-
perature of the Celestial spaces.

V\^KT(rr\^ vpo rap dX}m)p Kpdrei Beoi^ CTropevos.

Pythagoras.

]^o 9 ember 29.

I wro^te to George Ae Sampson : Art ^they
not two A#orfds0j>rour solitude and your society ?
one, heaven, the q^her, earth ; one, real, the
ot 4 ier apparent. And that society \ best and
unobjectionable which does* not violate your
solitude, but permits you to communicate the
very same train of thought. And then will our
true heaven be entered when we have learned
to be the same manner of person to others that
we are alone; say the same things to them, we
think alofte, and to pass out of solitude into
society without any change or effort. When an
awkward man is alone, he is graceful, all his

538 JOURNAl [Age 29

motions are natural.- When ^ vain m^n is'^alonoj,
his thoughts ^retwiSe. It is t^e presence' of
3thtr people whim embarrasses theln by over
exciting them, and they do and say jangraci€»us
things. The reason is, himseff is a peppor-corn ;
his relations to othet people are*the whole worJcT
in hfs imagination. ^ The only remedy must be
from the growth of his true sel^ ^ntj its master-
ing predominance over him, so that^the men
and things which looked so great shall shrink
to their true dimensions/ as already the hofise
in which we lived and the hills on which we ratf
in childhood^appe^ smaller than* they ;were.

[miss MARGARET TiTcKEr]

It is not certainly to gratify .any impatience
of domestic sorrow by a jparade of departed
me^ts that this notice of a worthy wofhan is
offered, jiut it is offered merely because many
wet eyes will look in the obit&ary and ask if
there is no word to be spoken over a dear and
honoured benefactress, a most gentle and vir-
tuous lady.

In the death of Miss Margaret Tucker one

1 This notice of Mr, Emerson* s loved sistgr-m-law # 7 as
probably printed in a Boston newspaper. It was wntten from
Malta^ February 2, but it seems best to introduce it here.^

'mARGARET tucker 5J9

^ho w^« fit, to be yi ornament of society
passSd away alt^ost unkndVnRo it. A beloved
memjbew of*a gifted family, to whom uncomnjop
acccAnplishgients and most attractive manners
were the ornament and riches of a most deli-
cafe f|i^e, she has^ spent l^r few years in re-
tirement. But in that family, and in fhe much
larger circle gf heft acquaintance, she was revered
and loyecL in an uncommon degree, and as she
de8erv;p(f. For she possessed the charm and
respect that always attaches to a strong sense,
\^hen united with elevated sentiments. I'iever
was aflytliing Itttle or mean ^th^^en m sus-^
pelted jn her. S|ie was flie considerate, j}ut
,1host liberal friend of all^ho needed assistance,
and many kn^Hbow ingeniously sometimes her
open hand sought ^e luxury of beneficence.
Hft exfreme delicacy and sweetness never suf-
fered her to wound the feelings of another, and,
thouglf almost ffll her life the victim of slow
but disheartening disease, it is not easy to re-
member that she ever complained. Few have
preserved such dignity and gentleness through
so long a term of sickness, or gone out of the
woi^d to.jfSin the friends she had never for-
gotten, mbre affectionately remembered by those
whom she has left in it.

5^0 JOURNAH. [Acb *9

[In Mr. Cabot’s Memoir (vol. j, pp.

175) are givetj fottr interesting fetters written at
\j:his crisis of Mr. Emerson’s life ; one .by him to
hi% brother William *telling him of the schemes
he was then revolving for the new life before him,
among them one for a new magazine v .whlTc’h
his bfothers should Join, — “ Giwe me my house-
hold gods against the world, ,^illiam, Edward
and Charles.” (William had Seen giving literary
lectures in New York.) Two letters follovjr from
Charles to his Aunt Mary, telling of the illAess
of Waldo (he was called so in the fanyly),and his
"decision to^t-a^to ^urope, and o^ his (^ha^les’s)
** growing disappdiotment as I go Sunc^ayvafter
Sunday and hear ordmary preachers,, apd re-
member what a torch of kindling eloquence has
been snuffed out in such »n insignificant fash-
ion.” Then follows a letter from Waldo tell/ng
William of his resolve to go to Europe instead
of visiting Edward in Porto Rico.]

>i 8 ’ 32 ] jQeADING 54^1

Au’thor.s Of . Bodies quoted, pr referred to
,» iN Journal for ^1832

2jtrozstcT^Zendyivesta,a.pud Histoire de V^a~
deme det Inscriptions; Pythagoras; Aristotle;

yuj^Kus Fabius Pictor, apud Cicero (?);

Cicero; Horace; St. Pau^; Plutarch,
medeSy P ericas i Seneca;

Legg^r^o da Vinci, apud Brewster’s Life of
Newt (in ;

Montaigne, /•Shakspeare ; Grotius ;

N^lton, Prose Works ; George Her-

bert ; .

prfbrge fi'ox, ^pud SeWcll’s History of the
,^aditirj,.*also Li^e of; ]^?hop Patrick, Parable
of a Pilgrim ; •

Fenelon, Fontenaj^le; Saurin;

Swedenborg; John Jortin;^

Fielding, Proverbs; Lucas, On HappinesSy
C^H(ftiness ; Jdfeeph Black;

Bentham; Patrick Henry; Moses Mendels-
sohn, ; Herschel, William and John;

Jung Stilling, Autobiography ;

Gocthcy apud Carlyle; Schiller; JohjwFlax-
mae, Beaiftjy Sculpturcy apud Rees' Encyclo-
pedia ; ,

^place; Schlegel, Guesses at Truth; Mai-

JOURNAL ^ [Acb 2g^

thus ; Bur,ps, P^ms ; Macluntosh^ Etbttal Pbiy
losophy ; Aberaetky,'Z.^f/«r« ; r
^ TjjfFrey; Hegel^; Pestalozzi, dpud Rtber;
Wordsworth LanCor, Imaginary^. Conversa-
tions ;

yioor^iPoems ; Daniell, M^teorological'^ifsays;
Mary Gomervill?, Mechanisni of the Heavens ;
Parry, Voyages ; Audubon ; Cousin ; Chan-
ning. Sermon on War; Carlyle, Cornlazo P^meSy
Sartor ResartuSy Life of Schiller ;

Edinburgh Review; New Jerusalem Maga-
zine. ,

BN0 OF VOLUME 11